Commons:Village pump/Archive/2010/04

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Commons:Deletion requests/File:Ste Mere Eglise Paratroopers from Heaven.jpg

Hi! There are two DRs in this page, one of 2009-10 (closed), one of 2010-03. Is there some formating to do in it to make that clearer (in Commons:Deletion_requests/2010/03/24#File:Ste_Mere_Eglise_Paratroopers_from_Heaven.jpg it's not clear at all). Thanks. --GaAs11671 10:40, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

No, see the log. The same file (299334216 from flickr) was already uploaded under the same name and nominated for deletion. --Martin H. (talk) 13:34, 1 April 2010 (UTC)
Yes, I understood that. My question was about some form of archiving the 1rst discussion on the DR page, so that it doesn't appears in the 2010/03/24 page. --GaAs11671 13:44, 1 April 2010 (UTC)
Its the regular way, that older deletion discussions are shown. If you dont want to have it on the log you can add <noinclude>...(old request)...</noinclude> arround the old request. However, in this case a deletion discussion is not even necessary, the case is clear. --Martin H. (talk) 14:04, 1 April 2010 (UTC)
I was thinking of something like Template:Collapse, but it's not very important. Thanks. --GaAs11671 14:10, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

new ZoomViewer gadget

I deployed a zooming image viewer on the toolserver. This is particularly useful to look at large images. It downloads multiresolution data incrementally (so you don't have to download the entire image, just the stuff you are actually looking at, good for low bandwidth, but also much faster for browsing images). There is a flash and a JavaScript version available. You can activate the ZoomViewer gadget in your preferences (Gadgets->Improved navigation) to show links to the viewer on the image description pages. Some examples:

Those examples above have all already been preprocessed. When you try to view an image for the first time it has to be fetched from commons and transformed into a zoomable image. This has to be done only once for each image (the result is then cached). The preprocessing can take up to 2 minutes. A status is displayed along with a little spinner. In some cases (for very large images) a page reload can be necessary. For even larger images the preprocessing program may exceed allowed memory consumption on the toolserver. I can then add the images manually (I might run a bot to process all of the largest images on commons). I would like to use the opportunity to thank the toolserver admins for their swift help finding bugs, installing software and giving programming advice! --Dschwen 00:58, 20 March 2010 (UTC)

A very nice gadget, I must admit. I'll definitely keep it enabled and I'm sure other users will like it as well.  Thank you.. --The Evil IP address (talk) 14:53, 20 March 2010 (UTC)
Really nice. But I got it to work only on the photos listed above. Enabling the gadget and using it on random (ordinary-sized) jpegs , I always get a "Not a valid JPG file!" message (both for the Flash and the JS versions), immediately after a message "Obtaining image data from Commons...". The same also when reloading after waiting a couple of minutes. No idea of what's happening. -- IANEZZ  (talk) 22:23, 20 March 2010 (UTC)
Shit. I know why, one second. --Dschwen (talk) 22:53, 20 March 2010 (UTC)
Ugh, some bowser cache confusion, feeding my 1yo, deleting my script(!) and rewriting it from an old backup, I think it is working again. If not please make absolutely sure your browser caches are cleared and tell me the name of the file that is not working. --Dschwen (talk) 00:31, 21 March 2010 (UTC)
Works perfectly now, thanks! -- IANEZZ  (talk) 09:14, 21 March 2010 (UTC)
Very nice! A back link to the commons page would be fine, especially for the license information and image description. --Kolossos (talk) 10:53, 21 March 2010 (UTC)
I know. I'm tying to find out how to best implement it. --Dschwen (talk) 14:56, 21 March 2010 (UTC)
Nice work anyway - thanks --Herby talk thyme 15:05, 21 March 2010 (UTC)
Great tool. BTW The gadget for zooming seems to interfere with the one for tineye. -- User:Docu at 07:27, 22 March 2010 (UTC), updated: 20:41, 22 March 2010 (UTC)
I tried it, seems great. For those who understand french, you can test its usefullness on this game (ie try to find the woman's legs on File:Arbre du prince Jean Luxembourg 2009 04.jpg). --GaAs11671 09:43, 24 March 2010 (UTC)

Just in case someone noticed. The processing of new images was broken for the last 24(?) hours, as a toolserver software upgrade made a recompilation of one of the processing tools necessary. It is now fully working again. --Dschwen (talk) 14:32, 25 March 2010 (UTC)

I uploaded a picture (File:Peterborough Cathedral March 2010.jpg) then viewed it in the ZoomViewer. 24 hours later I uploaded an updated version over the top of my first picture. A week after my second upload, when I use ZoomViewer, I still see the first version. Is there a way to force the ZoomViewer to use the new image? Seems like a 'Purge' button would be useful. NotFromUtrecht (talk) 12:27, 29 March 2010 (UTC)
Yes, that would be useful, or detection if a new version was uploaded. I'll work on that. --Dschwen (talk) 21:33, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

CatScan link in Vector skin

Vector skin currently doesn't show the Catscan link. Is there a way to add it to MediaWiki:Extra-tabs.js? -- User:Docu at 20:10, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Unless I'm mistaken, CatScan is shown when viewing a category page. -- IANEZZ  (talk) 21:20, 10 March 2010 (UTC)
Yes, it is on
but it's missing on:
unless it's hidden somwhere. -- User:Docu at 21:30, 10 March 2010 (UTC)
The little arrow to the right of the "star" button (which watchlists the page). When your mouse hovers over it, it shows all the extra tabs that would be displayed in monobook skin (catscan is in there). Vector is evil. :-) Killiondude (talk) 22:57, 10 March 2010 (UTC)
I have no "little arrow". No way to find it. I suppose it is the same for Docu. (But I like vector) --GaAs11671 00:25, 11 March 2010 (UTC)
The little arrow is visible in some other namespaces (e.g. "User talk:"), but not "Category:". Even de-activating all gadgets doesn't change it. -- User:Docu at 05:33, 11 March 2010 (UTC)
I see the "little arrow" in the link you provided above, which is in the category namespace. FWIW, I use Firefox 3.5. Killiondude (talk) 07:23, 11 March 2010 (UTC)
May be yo have it because as an administrator you have additionnal menus (such as "delete"). I have it on user: and user_talk:, on Commons talk:Village pump (which I can rename) but *not* on Commons:Village pump (is there some sort of protection ? I have the menu whith "rename" on Commons:Bistro) and *not* on file:.
I would say, the menu appears only if there something to put in it, and "catscan" is not counted as something when making this test.
--GaAs11671 08:12, 11 March 2010 (UTC)
Confirmed for Village pump: done archiving [move=sysop]. So with vector non-admin have the "arrow-menu" only for pages they have the right to rename. --GaAs11671 09:04, 11 March 2010 (UTC)
I listed this for the usability team at Commons:Usability_issues_and_ideas#Vector_skin_on_Commons. -- User:Docu at 09:19, 11 March 2010 (UTC)
Catrope, the Uer Experience Software Developer is looking into how to make CatScan visible in Vector for non-admins. Hopefully, we can restore it soon. --Shuhari (talk) 00:50, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

Related question: in the vector skin, is there a way to define custom drop-down lists? -- User:Docu at 09:19, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

Once upon a time, I did things like that. But it was long, long, time ago. Since then, they have been happy and have had a lot of children. --GaAs11671 17:58, 11 March 2010 (UTC)
Several tools currently add themselves to the toolbox or as additional tabs. It might look tidier of these were add to separate menus instead. That way they could have grand-children too ;) -- User:Docu at 03:47, 12 March 2010 (UTC)
I have fixed MediaWiki:Extra-tabs.js so it now adds tabs outside the dropdown, to the left of the watch star (not doing that results in border weirdness) and wrapped in <span> tags (not doing that results in a too large font size and other ugliness). On non-Vector-like skins (all other skins at this point) these rules are ignored, except for the span-wrapping (which is harmless in other skins).
This means tabs added by JavaScript using MediaWiki:Extra-tabs.js should now display the way you presumably expect them to (you may need to purge your browser cache before this fix takes effect). Tabs added by extensions may still defy your expectations; this will have to be fixed in the extensions themselves. --Catrope (talk) 19:39, 1 April 2010 (UTC)
Works for me. The fix made all other tabs appear too. Thanks for taking the time to look into this. A minor thing that is missing are the "Gallery, Orphans, Untagged" tabs on Special:Contributions/Catrope, but I don't mind. -- User:Docu at 17:12, 2010 April 5

March 24

Using PLURAL

I suppose PLURAL using default behaviour (English). Why isn't it switched depending on the language set in user settings? Wizardist (talk) 18:12, 27 March 2010 (UTC)

Wizardist, I have no idea what you are trying to say. Could you try wording this differently, or (if necessary to make yourself clear) saying it in a different language? - Jmabel ! talk 06:45, 28 March 2010 (UTC)
He's speaking about the parser function {{PLURAL:...}} which is used in message localization. It's always set to the wiki default language. The problem is: Mediawiki is designed for monolingual wikis and although multilingual wikis like Meta and Commons exist since many years there never was any effort to provide real multilingual support.
The best solution would be to allow to specify the wanted language as a parameter. Language set in user options is no good solution because that would also apply to messages in different languages.
Chances are low that the developers will improve this anytime soon. But it would be possible to reimplement the plural functionality in a template. --Slomox (talk) 17:32, 28 March 2010 (UTC)
I created {{Plural}}. It takes the same parameters as the parser function plus an additional lang parameter to specify the language. At the moment it supports the English, French and Czech behaviour. Other languages can be added too. The information about plural behaviour can be found in the language files at http://svn.wikimedia.org/svnroot/mediawiki/trunk/phase3/languages/classes/ --Slomox (talk) 17:44, 28 March 2010 (UTC)
Could you possibly add an explanation of {{Plural}} on its talk page, or somewhere appropriate? The parameters are totally obscure. - Jmabel ! talk 18:10, 29 March 2010 (UTC)
I added some documentation, and also a rule for Russian and some other related languages. There's still a whole bunch of languages with odd plural rules that need implementing, though. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 23:22, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

Should I set a DR each time I have a doubt?

I have doubts about that. I don't want to be classified as a deletionist (I'm not, imho). But very often I see files whith a very questionnable {{Own}}, and in most cases I pretend having seen nothing, as it is more comfortable (I fear potentially induced problems as a pest).

Do you think I should click on the "nominate for deletion" link, even if I am not convinced? --GaAs11671 16:50, 30 March 2010 (UTC)

I should say: If you are not convinced, no, but if you have serious doubt and want community opinion, yes.--Havang(nl) (talk) 17:00, 30 March 2010 (UTC)
To be factual, here are some examples:
I've said it: I'm not sure. The question is: would it be considered as "disorganizing" Commons if I nominated such files for deletion?
--GaAs11671 17:11, 30 March 2010 (UTC)
Checking the talk page for previous warnings should be done with care. It may serve as an antecedent only with obvious copyvios, such as CD covers, videogame screenshots, movie posters, etc. Sometimes an image is deleted after a DR where highly complex legal or technical topics have been discussed, such as whenever freedom of panorama applies, if a work falls within a type of work as defined at X law or not, etc. Even if the image ends deleted, we wouldn't be able to say that the uploader uploaded a copyright violation on purpose, or that all his other uploads may be likely to be copyright violations Belgrano (talk) 17:35, 30 March 2010 (UTC)
You are right about the antecedents of users. I now think the best way to handle that is to pretend you never saw the problem. I'll apply this policy from now. Thanks for this answer. --GaAs11671 17:46, 30 March 2010 (UTC)
That's not what I said. The antecedents of the user are just one of the things that may be considered. If there is some other compeling reason to believe a work is an unlikely own work (for example, a satellite photo), then you should point so. If you can't come up with such a reason, then you should leave it. But in any case, this is my opinion, not a written policy. Your opinion is as much valuable as mine. Belgrano (talk) 18:15, 30 March 2010 (UTC)
That's not what you said, of course. But that's what I'll do. And the funny thing is no-one will ever be able to prove the things I didn't do, as if I don't do it there is no evidence I should have done it lol--GaAs11671 18:26, 30 March 2010 (UTC)
I think in case of vague doubts you should perform reasonable research before DR, and in my opinion in this case your research wasn't deep enough. For example, before DR because of broken link you should (in my opinion, only in my opinion) try to fix this link -- external links brokes all the time, and in this case it was very easy to fix it using Internet Archive. If you doubt own work claim because of some number of deleted user uploads, you should check why these uploads have been deleted. Trycatch (talk) 19:21, 30 March 2010 (UTC)
I think I should maintain a list of files I didn't resquest for deletion -- not public, of course! --GaAs11671 20:44, 30 March 2010 (UTC)
You sound delightful. Killiondude (talk) 21:47, 30 March 2010 (UTC)
I sometimes leave a murmur of doubt on the talk page of the uploaded file. /Pieter Kuiper (talk) 22:01, 30 March 2010 (UTC)
+1 like P. Kuiper: better to use the discussion page. the file with the catskull: this user had uploaded several similar images - it is not impossible that there are really scientists and non-dilettants that upload images..... - but if it is taken from a scientific collection , he should make a reference to it, thats true. Cholo Aleman (talk) 22:35, 30 March 2010 (UTC)

If they look valuable to me, I try a lot more to avoid DR. If the images look pretty useless, then I don't hesitate very long. Amada44 (talk) 06:45, 31 March 2010 (UTC)

 Comment - very nice examples to illustrate useless and "out of scope" files - but quite different from the problem of user:GaAs Cholo Aleman (talk) 20:13, 31 March 2010 (UTC)
well, what you are saying is partly true ;-) The seleced images are not the best ones to make my point. What I ment was, that if a image is very good, I will try to find the source or whatever it needs so it can stay (or I'll even create new files). If they are not bad quality and doutful --> off they go to the trash. So depending on the quality of doughtful images I spend more or less time in looking into the matter. Amada44 (talk) 20:43, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

Commons does seem to lack a convenient place to ask for second or third opinions on doubtful files — as far as the official processes go, you can either request deletion or do nothing at all. And even deletion requests don't always receive as much attention as they'd deserve. Of course, it's always possible to bring up issues on the file's talk page (if anyone happens to look there), on the uploader's user talk page (if they're active), at Commons talk:Licensing (for some issues) or here at the village pump (which works, but makes the place even more noisy), but all these alternatives have their disadvantages as I've noted. (Also, if its your own file you'd like to request a second opinion on, the first two options are pretty much out anyway.)

It might be a good idea to start a page like Commons:Media review for that purpose, in more or less the same format as the village pump. Or, alternatively, we could just encourage people to bring up such issues here, and possibly later spin them off to a separate page if and when they start taking up too much space here. In fact, I'll hereby recommend that we do just that. Any objections? —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 12:23, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

  • Both Commons talk:Licensing and/or Commons talk:PD files (if the picture is licenced as PD) are good places to talk about your doubts. Teofilo (talk) 14:23, 1 April 2010 (UTC)
    • Mon sentiment est que ces pages sont réservées à des cas génériques (généralisables). But I take note that you encourage me to use theese pages, donc je le ferai. --GaAs11671 18:06, 1 April 2010 (UTC)
      • I've seen both of those pages used to discuss individual files, at least when the questions pertain to the subject of the page (i.e. "Is this file really PD?" or "Is the license for this file valid?"). Still, it's not really their main purpose, and in any case those subjects would still seem to exclude some potential sources of doubt, such as the ones in your examples above ("Is this file adequately sourced?" or "Does this really look like a self-made work?") as well as others (like "Does this count as a derivative work?" or "Is this really in scope for Commons?"). Of course, some of those could probably be productively asked on other Commons talk pages, like Commons talk:Derivative works or Commons talk:Project scope, but it does seem to me that a single place for all such questions (and others I didn't think of right now) might perhaps not be a bad thing to have. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 18:31, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

An alternative may be to reformulate the question, from "is this image valid" to "are images with some X detail or circumstance valid"? For example, we may safely say that all images that despict a president talking with his ministers or other politicians inside the government house would never be real "own works", either another licence applies (such as {{PD-USGov}}) or it's a copyright violation Belgrano (talk) 19:20, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

"Never" can be quite a strong word, though. Don't we have some contributors with press credentials? I thought we did... —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 21:38, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

March 31

deletion of good images

Do images like this and this really have to be deleted??? Who would claim copyright?? Amada44 (talk) 14:20, 31 March 2010 (UTC)

Yes they do; see COM:PRP. Stifle (talk) 14:23, 31 March 2010 (UTC)
The 2nd one is a special case (used via a template more than 2000 times) that I mentionned on Commons:Deletion requests/File:Metro porte Dauphine (1).jpg. --GaAs11671 14:48, 31 March 2010 (UTC)
is the building itself protected by copyright? Amada44 (talk) 15:10, 31 March 2010 (UTC)
Yes, until 2013-01-01. All we can do is what I wrote on the 1rst DR: « Just make this discussion last for 33 month ». --GaAs11671 15:17, 31 March 2010 (UTC)
in my opinion it is a caricature of the duties of an archive like this, if everybody can upload files like these, they are used for 1.5 years, and then somebody is just finding out (correctly) that they are copyright violations and they are deleted according to the law. If we want to implement a "precautionary principle" the proof that there is no copy violation must be done at the beginning - and has to be approved in a space before the real upload. (As far as I understand the German Wikipedia implements a "Dateiüberprüfung" - but I am far away from saying that the German WP is better than others.) The consequences would be a drastically reduced growth, but a better quality (at least for copyright violations) Cholo Aleman (talk) 20:27, 31 March 2010 (UTC)
Commons ought to adopt the policy suggested by Mike Godwin in Commons:Deletion requests/File:2004 Landmark v Ross answer.pdf - just wait for a take-down notice. /Pieter Kuiper (talk) 20:39, 31 March 2010 (UTC)
It could be a good idea. For example, for buildings FOP in France, we know the few architects which are problematic (beginning by this one), just ban these one, for the remaining 99% they have never said anything. --GaAs11671 21:56, 31 March 2010 (UTC)
I would support that! Amada44 (talk) 09:11, 1 April 2010 (UTC)
@Pieter, with that strategy we would expose the re-users to litigation. Mike Godwin is in a somewhat comfortable position as institutions in other countries than the US are unlikely to sue Wikimedia. Would he say the same if it is about let's say, Corbis or Getty Images? --Túrelio (talk) 09:21, 1 April 2010 (UTC)
Of course Commons should not host images that are likely to invite take-down notices. But most of the discussions here are about stuff like anonymous WWI photos or photos of office building in Romania. Commons needs a more sensible approach to copyright. And it should give better service to the wikipedias, allowing images that will never cause problems in the context of an article. /Pieter Kuiper (talk) 09:49, 1 April 2010 (UTC)
That could be an interesting alternative. The copyright laws, how well intended they might be, protect very well the very famous artists (0,001 % ?) but block the spreading of the works from 99,999 %, the bulk of them. --Foroa (talk) 13:11, 1 April 2010 (UTC)
This is the same issue I raised earlier. Here's another fine image at risk There are no legal implications, it's purely a matter of the policy agreed by the commons community. In a very similar case the community voted 54 to 7 to create an exception to our policy that one category of images need to be public domain both in U.S. and country of origin. I suggest we should try to get a similar exception for buildings. 9carney (talk) 19:08, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

Copyrights of Photos of soviets WW2 Bombers

According this:http://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%A4%D0%B0%D0%B9%D0%BB:Pe-8.jpg In fact, the copyright of this photo does not belong to Russia, the photo captured Commissar Molotov's arrival in England at 1942, and this picture made by English photographer.

Second photo taken photographer NII VVS during flight tests and formally belongs to the Rus. Fed. Defense Ministry. But not once in the history RFDM not require royalties for documents belonging to them are in the archives. For second photo normally working "70year cap" license. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Dlinevitch (talk • contribs) 13:05, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

This probably belongs at Commons:Deletion requests/File:Pe-8.jpg. I've copied it there. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 19:41, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

Derivatives of deleted files

We should not delete files before ensuring the derivatives are correctly described. I don't say that for anyone in particular, it's just such cases are not so rare:

  1. sr:Слика:DemoBIH2006.PNG (original or not?) (deleted 2007-01 because transfered to Commons?)
  2. en:File:DemoBIH2006.PNG (copied from #1 no author and no original source given) (deleted 2006-12 because transfered to Commons)
  3. File:DemoBIH2006.PNG (copied from #2) (deleted 2008-06 because duplicate of #4)
  4. File:DemoBIH2006a.png (derivative from #2) (DR in 2010-03 because no source)

That's sure, after such a life, the image of today has no initial author, no clear sources, no traceability of the license. So it should be deleted?

OK, I'll try to contact admins at sr: but what a loss of time... --GaAs11671 13:34, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

Do you think that making a merge of history of description pages would be a useful thing? --GaAs11671 18:12, 1 April 2010 (UTC)
Hmm, yes, it could be. I think it would require an adminbot to implement, though (if I understand what you're suggesting correctly). Also, it still wouldn't help with files manually copied between wikis; for example in this case, even if the person who moved the image from en.wikipedia had used such a tool, the transferred description page would only have contained the description from that wiki, which only said (I just checked, I'm an admin there):

Taken from Serbian Wikipedia, the [[Republika Srpska]] article. It was created by a Serbian user based on various statistical data. There are some inaccuracies in the map (borders of Brčko district, etc.)

I can't really think of any way to make an automatic tool smart enough to track down the actual source based on that. (Well, actually I can, sort of, but it would probably have a huge error rate.) A human could've done it, but obviously neither the user who moved the image to Commons nor either of the admins who deleted the local copies actually did. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 19:24, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

Upload form errors

When I upload a picture via classic upload form (I use this, it is much more reliable than commonist) every time I press "upload" button == Summary == == Summary == is inserted to the file description. I have found no way how to block it. Check my contributions, you can see details of this problems. Can you help me to fix this? It is quite annoying. Thanks. --Aktron (talk) 15:58, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

Maybe your text has == Summary == prepended? I know that the basic upload form automatically does this for you. ZooFari 16:23, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

April 3

Chinese ? - Japanese?

User Zhangyiro1911 contributed several files, see http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/Zhangyiruo1911 - are these documents etc. are chinese?? Thanks Cholo Aleman (talk) 20:35, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

Yes, they are Chinese (including some "documents" about the trial of Zhang Yiruo in 1953) - except that for many of the files, (s)he used a numbering system that begins with 扫描, i.e. "lastscan". Perhaps you want to change them? Newfraferz17 (talk) 01:28, 2 April 2010 (UTC)
Just a simple way to find out what language it is: see http://translate.google.be/#auto%7Cen%7C Wouter (talk) 16:59, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

April 2

New IMAGE

I have recently uploaded a new photograph: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Polish_humvees_in_Iraq.jpg

Is anything OK with it? Is the information OK? --A.Ceta (talk) 08:47, 2 April 2010 (UTC)--A.Ceta (talk) 08:47, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

Looks good, it's even better to include {{ID-USMil}}. Multichill (talk) 09:00, 2 April 2010 (UTC)
How did you create the description? It didn't use the autotranslated section titles [1], which is *bad* ;-) --GaAs11671 12:49, 2 April 2010 (UTC)
I presume he just uploaded normally. See COM:FAQ#Why is the text of my new uploads corrected soon after upload? and the section just one below that one. BTW, the correct change would use "{{int:license-header}}". MediaWiki:License-header is for file description pages, whereas MediaWiki:License is the label on the upload form. Lupo 15:13, 2 April 2010 (UTC)
Hello and thank you all for your help! I was using the Upload file link on the left hand side. There I decided to chose the option US governmental source or something like that. Then I filled the open fields. That was all. --A.Ceta (talk) 14:47, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

Update hubblesite copyright template

Hello everybody.

Hubblesite.org has changed his copyright policies (move to CC by). I've changed this template. --ComputerHotline (talk) 07:32, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

Cannot change from PD to a more restrictive license. /Pieter Kuiper (talk) 08:16, 3 April 2010 (UTC)
And where did you see they changed their license? [2] still says PD. Only spacetelescope.org changed their license some time ago, but it's not retroactive, and we already have {{Cc-Hubble}} for that. I've reverted because in any case we should not relicense the images that we got under PD. –Tryphon☂ 08:46, 3 April 2010 (UTC)
Here--ComputerHotline (talk) 09:42, 3 April 2010 (UTC).
That's Spacetelescope, not Hubblesite...I see no mention of Hubblesite having changed their license on the link you gave. — Huntster (t @ c) 10:05, 3 April 2010 (UTC)
Indeed. That license change happened several months ago, but has no influence on images hosted at hubblesite.org (in fact, if an image is hosted on both sites, we can choose the less restrictive license and tag it with {{PD-Hubble}}). On top of that, it is almost never appropriate to modify an existing license template to change its license terms; free licenses cannot be revoked, so no matter what license change happens now, the images we already have continue being PD. –Tryphon☂ 10:24, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

By year categories

How small subjects is it reasonable to divide into categories by year? Category:Bertil Ohlin with four imges was divided like that. I think that was clearly not useful, so I put the images back in the main category. That means the images are now overcategorised, but I think that is better than having to look in three different categories to see all four images. For larger subjects with hundreds or thousands of images I can see tha such subdivision can be useful (as long as it is not the only division). /Ö 13:35, 13 March 2010 (UTC)

Another question is what should be in the countries by year categories. They can be strictly geographical for images taken in the country, or they can be wider and include all images related the country. For example should Nikita Khrushchev in 1964 be in 1964 in the Soviet Union because Khrushchev was from the Soviet Union, even if currently all images in the category are taken in Sweden? Or not in any by country category, since people can travel and are not always in the same country for a whole year? Should an image of a japanese singer in Sweden be categorised "in Japan" just because the singer is from Japan? /Ö 13:38, 13 March 2010 (UTC)

As you can read, it was a Swedish TV show (Hylands hörna) which broadcasted live from Tokyo, Japan just that day, because of the 1964 Olympic Summer Games in that town. I added Sweden too since the show was aimed to Sweden. J 1982 (talk) 17:24, 13 March 2010 (UTC)
It is very annoying to see categories fragmented like this. And for many images, the year is not important. /Pieter Kuiper (talk) 20:35, 16 March 2010 (UTC)
I think indeed that we are heading towards significant fragmentation problems if we don't find solutions for the real "overcategorization" problem: too many/deep specialists subcategories makes it very hard to categorise and find items for non specialists or when no precise criteria (such as date) are available. If for example, one categorises some windmills in a separate specialised postmills category, few people will be able to find and categorise "generic" windmills in that structure. I think that it is time to introduce some concept of specialist or side-categories that allow to avoid the "overcategorization" mantra. --Foroa (talk) 07:33, 17 March 2010 (UTC)
User refuses to discuss, just goes on and on. /Pieter Kuiper (talk) 13:24, 20 March 2010 (UTC)
Year is important. Some people like to think, when watchin a town, "-That's how it looked in 1997, and that's in 2004". They think of what has changed, and what has not. J 1982 (talk) 18:24, 20 March 2010 (UTC)
From your user name it is clear that you think so. But users generally want images of a place. Things do not change by year. Fragmenting the images that we have of Cracow in Category:Kraków by decade is not a good idea. If a town-category gets overpopulated, it should be diffused by neighbourhood, or by building. Not primarily by decade, be year, or by month. But diffusing by neighboorhood requires some local knowledge. /Pieter Kuiper (talk) 18:36, 20 March 2010 (UTC)
More fragmentation in Category:18th-century architecture in Sweden. Putting a definite year on a church is a bit arbitrary: when did the architect make the drawings, what was the date on the "first stone", when was the building consacrated? That is a span a several years. /Pieter Kuiper (talk) 21:52, 25 March 2010 (UTC)

If it is a subject I can take a picture on any moment, it shouldnt be categorised by time. But I have uploaded historical pictures where is usefull. example Category:1982 in rail transport. It is a usefull snapshot at wat was going on in 1982. But is not useful to create a subcategory rail/country/year as the images are already categorised by the normal technical and geografic categories. Smiley.toerist (talk) 14:10, 29 March 2010 (UTC)

Agree completely. I don't see any value to adding specific date categories on a historic building or other subject which has looked the same for a long time. Doing so will clutter those categories and make them less useful for finding events which really are tied to a date. Jonathunder (talk) 20:53, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

Do we have an copyrighted 18th Century work falsely as PD?

http://blog.librarylaw.com/librarylaw/2010/03/factoids-what-is-the-oldest-work-protected-by-copyright-in-the-us-what-work-will-have-the-longest-protection.html --Histo (talk) 20:33, 29 March 2010 (UTC)

Probably, if what that blogger said is true. We have a bad problem with labelling US works with PD-old based on the author's life, which is irrelevant in the US (until 1978). Rocket000 (talk) 21:15, 29 March 2010 (UTC)
The blogs makes a critic to the file File:Adams_diary_1.jpg, but it isn't uploaded here but locally at wikisource. Perhaps a deletion request, or whatever system is employed there, should be used to clarify this Belgrano (talk) 21:45, 29 March 2010 (UTC)
No, it is definitely located here: File:Adams diary 1.jpg. The Wikisource link they used is just a redirect here. — Huntster (t @ c) 23:46, 29 March 2010 (UTC)
Well they were published before 1989, and it is not clear that a copyright notice on the book would cover the letters themselves (since the book publishers were emphatically not the authors of the letters, and may well not have had grounds to claim copyright in them). But, copyright transfer rules were ambiguous before 1978, and the owner may have a claim. Pretty fuzzy though. Seems pretty extreme for a DR. Carl Lindberg (talk) 20:45, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

March 30

Proposal to harmonize positioning of superseded templates

As far as I'm aware, I don't believe there are any guidelines or proposals regarding the positioning of superseded templates (e.g. {{Vva}}) within file pages. Common locations of the template placements include underneath the license template (ex), below the information template (ex), or prepended above the page (ex). In my opinion, having these templates scattered around the file page makes it less convenient for people, especially graphists, to locate. We have forgotten all about the "other versions=" parameter of the {{Information}} template. Nowadays, I place the superseded template in the "other versions" parameter and it seems to work fine and keeps the page well organized IMO (ex). With the exception of file pages lacking the information template, I propose that superseded templates are placed in that parameter to keep file pages consistent. A bot script could be requested to do this job should this proposal come to an agreement. ZooFari 20:15, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

I think it would be better if people could just easily program their preferred order via a script. Other people might not care for such templates in the "other versions" cell. --The Evil IP address (talk) 21:22, 1 April 2010 (UTC)
"Other versions" seems to be place to recommend if one wants to know where to place them. I'm not sure though if it's worth going through all pages to rearrange them accordingly. -- User:Docu at 03:47, 4 April 2010 (UTC)

Remove

I want to remove a picture of Edgar Allan Poe that has a bad name. The picture is drawn by Aubrey Beardsley, but by mistake I uploaded it as drawn by Ambrose Bierce. It must have been because they both have the initials AB. I have uploaded it again as drawn by Aubrey Beardsley, but now there is one duplicate that is incorrect, it is called File:Edgar Allan Poe Ambrose Bierce.jpg.Gegik (talk) 01:54, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

✓ Done. Next time you may add the {{Duplicate|good file.jpg}} -code which will place it in a special list that admins regularly check. Thanks, greetings –Krinkletalk 01:58, 2 April 2010 (UTC)
If you are fixing your own upload, use {{Badname}} instead of {{Duplicate}} -- that usually gets handled more quickly as there is less to decide/investigate. Carl Lindberg (talk) 20:56, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

File:EdRoberts1975.jpg

EdRoberts1975.jpg is licensed as public domain no notice. The publication date is given as 1975. A careful reading of the source[3] shows the photo was taken at the "Personal Computer Pioneers Day" held on June 14, 1986 and published by The Computer Museum of Boston in the Fall of 1986. (The collection of this museum was transferred to the Computer History Museum in Mountain View CA.} The uploader, Night Ranger agrees the image should be deleted.[4] -- Swtpc6800 (talk) 05:35, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

Copyright notices were required before March 1, 1989... but if there is no evidence for the lack of notice on the actual publication of that era, better to delete. Carl Lindberg (talk) 20:59, 3 April 2010 (UTC)
I have put a copyvio tag on the image and left a note on Night Ranger talk page. -- Swtpc6800 (talk) 23:48, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

How does it serve the goals of this project to delete hundreds of images of PD buildings?

I admit that the question is not 100% accurate but I use that wording to make the point that in the great majority of jurisdictions, including the one in which Wikimedia's servers are located, photographing a building has no more legal implications than photographing a sunset - the only copyright which exists belongs to the photographer. Whatever copyright exists in the architect's plans or the constructed building is irrelevant.

We all know that there are a few countries where this is not the case, and while we should generally respect other countries copyright law as best we can, that surely need not include cases where there is something particularly strange about the copyright situation in those countries (wording pirated from Jimbo).

As Wikimedia's servers are located in the US, the images we host must obey the relevant US law, everything else is a matter of policy and if the current policy doesn't fit the aims of the project then the policy should be changed.

The Wikimedia Foundations's approved definition of "Free Cultural Works" can be summarised as "work which is free from copyright-like restriction anywhere"

I'm sure that it was never the intention to exclude works which fail the "anywhere" test just because of a few legal quirks in a handful of countries. I feel that "almost anywhere" is free enough in this case for the purposes of this project.

The Commons community previously approved one exception where copyright laws are inconsistent between countries.

I feel that a similar exception for images of buildings would be in keeping with the principles of the project. What do you think? 9carney (talk) 18:22, 28 March 2010 (UTC)

One problem is not quirky laws, but short laws. If the law of United Emirates does not have a clause exempting photos of architecture, commons is going on these deletion sprees. Whatever the actual case law or common practice on the ground (except for the case of Israel). /Pieter Kuiper (talk) 18:30, 28 March 2010 (UTC)
« As Wikimedia's servers are located in the US » is not relevant, as most users here are not from the United States. And more, the objective of Mediawiki is to bring knowledge to every people in the world, 95% of them being outside of US. Please, remember. --GaAs11671 19:46, 28 March 2010 (UTC)
GaAs, that's not true (about the server location being irrelevant). Take a look at COM:L#Interaction of United States copyright law and non-US copyright law. Killiondude (talk) 20:28, 28 March 2010 (UTC)
And the objective of MediaWiki is to create wiki software to run Wikimedia projects. Rocket000 (talk) 05:15, 29 March 2010 (UTC)

I am also strictly against the deletionism of Non-FOP-pictures. We should ask Wikimedia Foundation if they would accept a rule that only US-FOP counts here. Then we can make a poll if we want this. We can change our policies like any other project and I think the FOP case is the most important case of policy change --Histo (talk) 20:39, 29 March 2010 (UTC)

"...that only US-FOP counts here..." What about sculptures? Lupo 20:45, 29 March 2010 (UTC)

The law is the law. We follow it until something changes. Blurpeace 00:46, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

The the legal position is very clear. No laws need to change to allow us to host these images, only our own policy. 9carney (talk) 18:49, 3 April 2010 (UTC)
You are correct that it is not a matter of legality -- photos of buildings should be completely fine (well, provided the photo is licensed) in the United States, and even photos of statues should almost always be fair use on Wikimedia projects anyways. It is a bit more than Commons policy though -- it is Wikimedia Foundation policy as well, which also runs in to the projects which use them -- we want images to be "free", a definition based around copyright and all its technicalities, and additionally the Foundation has specified that Commons cannot keep images under fair use rationales. While I don't like deletions based on theoretical reasoning -- if nobody has ever lost a court case over a particular type of image or derivative work, we should keep them -- these are a bit different, as there are a number of (successful) court cases over images of this type, in the U.S. and elsewhere (including photos of buildings), so there are definite copyright-related issues with them. It is definitely frustrating, and perhaps we need some sort of intermediate photo database ("as free as we can get" photos of copyrighted objects, which wikipedias realistically need photos for). But there are definite philosophic issues which go beyond Commons policy alone. But if the Foundation is amenable for keeping all photos of buildings (arguably OK under U.S. law), that could be an approach. That is probably more problematic than the PD-Art decision though. Carl Lindberg (talk) 20:35, 3 April 2010 (UTC)
Carl has expressed my thoughts on the matter (I wasn't looking to make a lengthy statement). Wikimedia Commons attempts to collect a database of works free, in a sense, "worldwide". What you are suggesting bypasses law in the source country for ours. We can't just make exceptions for specific countries while we don't for others. Blurpeace 21:03, 3 April 2010 (UTC)
The Foundation's lawyer consistently tells us that Commons ought to relax policy, most recently here. /Pieter Kuiper (talk) 21:11, 3 April 2010 (UTC)
It might be possible to relax the policy, mark the image with a warning that it might not be free for all use everywhere, and delete images where there is a genuine objection. Such a policy would in effect focus more on the use of pictures on Commons from those who are currently using pictures from here (Wikipedia etc.), rather than on the use by some hypothetical future user from outside the Wikimedia projects. It might then be that pictures of buildings in France could only be used in the non-French Wikipedias, and so on, but it would still serve the primary users of Commons better than the current policy. It is the case already that not all ways of reuse of pictures are possible, this would only extend that to another area. A warning on the picture page might be in useful in these cases.
Such a relaxation of the policy might lead to a situation where a newspaper in India could find a picture of a building in France for illustrating a news-item, a student might use the picture for his thesis, but someone who were looking to publish a book on the architect might not be able to use it. The latter I think would anyway want to have his own pictures taken. I would support such a relaxation of the policy, and would myself have at least one photo of an interesting modern building in Italy to upload. Haros (talk) 09:44, 5 April 2010 (UTC)
That's precisely what commons voted for in respect of photos of old paintings: Create an exception to our licensing policy and add a warning for the images in question. I believe it would equally serve the goals of this project to do the same for buildings. 9carney (talk) 12:55, 5 April 2010 (UTC)
Yes, but that came due to a Foundation belief (backed up by U.S. law, and likely in most countries, and even in the U.K. there has not been an explicit courtroom test of the theory that they may be copyrightable there) that straight-on photos of PD paintings should be considered as copies, and should be free. That did not extend to ignoring a still-valid copyright on the underlying work itself. It is a bit different situation, and we would probably prefer to have a similar philosophical statement from the Foundation, rather than a practical, legal one (since the problems are primarily with the philosophical issue of what is "free", which we are mandated to follow). Carl Lindberg (talk) 14:38, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

Carl Lindberg, you mentioned a number of court cases, do you know of any in the US courts regarding photos of buildings? I know the designer of the w:Atomium sent a take down notice to a US website but it did not seem to have led to a court case. Reading w:Copyright in architecture in the United States suggests that it was a textbook example of w:copyfraud. 9carney (talk) 12:55, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

The building court cases were in other countries (one in Germany that I know of, and I think a couple in France). Photos of buildings in the U.S. are basically always OK. Buildings completed prior to 1990 were not copyrightable in the first place in the U.S., and the current law explicitly limits the derivative rights of the architectural copyright so to not extend to photographs of the buildings, so they are not (in the eyes of the law) derivative works. There is no such limitation mentioned for sculpture though, and there have been a number of court cases on those (not consistently decided, but plenty enough to presume there is a real issue). The Atomium really isn't a building; I would guess it would be considered a sculpture. Carl Lindberg (talk) 14:38, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

question

I read, half a dozen years or so, that a new pastime was to google one's self, to see how famous you were. Last night I did that -- not outo of vanity, but because another wikipedia contributor was complaining that some of my pages of notes, in my wikipedia User space were showing up on his google searches, and he wanted me to place __NOINDEX__ on them.

My google search turned up an image, republished elsewhere, that was being credited to me.

I think it is a sign that an online publication had turned to the commons for public domain images, had intended to credit the actual photographer, and had credited the uploader by mistake. The image was still in google's cache, but the actual article was 404.

I welcome opinions, on what obligation, if any, I have to try to clarify the record.

I wonder whether there is some step we should take to further clarify that the uploader is not necessarily the photographer?

Cheers! Geo Swan (talk) 21:01, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

Perhaps usage of {{Credit line}} should be furtherly encouraged. IMHO, it could be helpful to extend the upload forms with a further textfield for it. -- IANEZZ  (talk) 21:48, 3 April 2010 (UTC)
I was not familiar with {{Credit line}}. I just looked at the documentation, and I have a couple of questions:
  1. The {{Credit line}} template's author field and the {{Information}} template's author field have different purposes -- when would these fields have different values? If they don't have different purposes would it be possible to require uploaders to use just one author field?
  2. The documentations says all the fields are optional. So, when used with no fields filled the template is a no-op?
  3. Is it a good idea or a bad ida to use it thus: {{Credit line | Author = ~~~ | License= {{cc-by-sa}} }}
Cheers! Geo Swan (talk) 00:17, 4 April 2010 (UTC)
Well, {{Credit line}} is meant to display the text that should be used verbatim in attributing the work, which may not be the same as the author's name, or not limited to the author's name. See for example File:6 Warszawa Natolin 122.jpg, where the credit line includes also a title of the photo set.
For your second question: a {{Credit line}} without parameters isn't really that useful, but it's not a no-op, since it still expands to a row of a wikitable with a heading. Perhaps it should emit a warning in this case.
Finally, {{Credit line | Author = ~~~ | License= {{cc-by-sa}} }} is not a good idea, for two reasons: first, license tags such as {{cc-by-sa}} expand to large info boxes which should be integrally be reported in printed publications, whereas the license name (and a link) should be enough; secondarily, ~~~ expands to a full signature including the talkback link, which is meaningless in printed publications. Personally, I think of {{Credit line}} as a one-liner that could be used also outside the web (i.e. on printed media). -- IANEZZ  (talk) 09:52, 4 April 2010 (UTC)
Note that a credit line can be speficied within the CC templates, such as in File:Quartz-22021.jpg. Jean-Fred (talk) 10:14, 4 April 2010 (UTC)
Yeah, you should use the Creative Commons attribution option. {{Credit line}} was probably created by people who didn't know that the attribution option existed. Multichill (talk) 08:08, 5 April 2010 (UTC)
All instances of {{Credit line}} should be replaced by updated Creative Commons templates and than nuked. Multichill (talk) 08:08, 5 April 2010 (UTC)
Template:Credit line and Commons:Credit line were created as a result of a long discussion on VP (here) after proposal to create a single uniform place where reusers can find info on how to attribute the image, in the form similar to other image repositories. At the time of its creation there was no attribution option which was added only few months ago to templates like {{Self}} or {{Cc-by-sa-3.0}}. I still think all images should explicitly spell out how they should be attributed in order to help reusers comply with the license, and that such attributions would be easier to find in the {{Information}} template, but I do like the fact that placement in the license templates couples it more tightly with the license. So in the end I do not care where attribution string will be displayed. One problem I have with the current use of the attribution parameter is that it is often misused. For example File:Fotothek df n-06 0000274.jpg uses attribution "Deutsche Fotothek‎" but without mention of the author or the license, we seems to be encouraging breaking the license by improper attribution (see Commons:Credit line or the license itself for required form of attribution). --Jarekt (talk) 13:59, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

April 4

File:The Hume.djvu - missing rights ?

A very valuable book - but it is a copyright violation, isnt it? (Or is there a license to copy the books of the Cambridge University Press? :) Cholo Aleman (talk) 18:41, 4 April 2010 (UTC)

from the same user: Henri Bergson with a NASA Licence, see File:Essaisurlesdonn00berguoft.djvu - sorry for these stupid questions, but this is very strange for me. Cholo Aleman (talk) 18:44, 4 April 2010 (UTC)

The book on Hume looks like a blatant copyright violation to me – it was first published in 1993. What is more, the uploader filled in the information template with "test". As for the Bergson work, the NASA licence is clearly spurious. Bergson died on 4 January 1941, so if copyright runs for 70 years from the year of his death (see "Commons:Licensing#France"), the work will enter the public domain at the start of 2012. However, there seems to be a possibility of a copyright extension due to World War II: see "Commons:Licensing#Wartime copyright extensions", which is a little hard to understand. In summary, both of the uploads are currently still copyrighted and should be nominated for deletion, and the uploader should be advised not to upload such works. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 19:21, 4 April 2010 (UTC)
File:The Hume.djvu is a blatant copyright violation, in the U.S. and basically everywhere else. That should be speedy deleted. File:Essaisurlesdonn00berguoft.djvu was published in 1889, so it is PD in the U.S. (and thus can legitimately appear on Internet Archive, the claimed source), but if the French author died in 1941, then it is still copyrighted there until 2012, and it should be deleted. (The wartime extensions are mostly moot; that section needs to be updated -- pretty sure the French courts ruled they didn't get the extension from 70 years but rather the 50 p.m.a. term, so only if a work originally has the 30-year extension for having "died in the service of France" could the term be higher than 70 p.m.a.[5]). I can't fathom how the NASA license would apply. File:Treatiseofhumann01humeuoft.djvu, by the same uploader, is also a slight issue -- while the bulk is a reprint of Hume's 1700s work, and that volume itself appears that it was first published in 1888 in Great Britain (though that is a later reprint) and thus PD in the U.S., there is a forward by the editor Sir Lewis Amherst Selby-Bigge (1860-1951) and that bit would appear to still be under copyright. Carl Lindberg (talk) 20:13, 4 April 2010 (UTC)
Regarding "Treatiseofhumann01humeuoft.djvu": perhaps a version with the foreword removed (and a note explaining why) can be uploaded? I'm not sure how to edit djvu files. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 20:46, 4 April 2010 (UTC)
Both are zapped. Adam Cuerden (talk) 20:37, 4 April 2010 (UTC)
Thanks to all - I learn that "zapped" means "deleted". :) Cholo Aleman (talk) 03:48, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

Questions on Creative Commons license

I am working with a professional photographer who is willing to release a cropped low resolution (200 x 300) portrait for a Wikipedia biography. This would be under a Creative Commons license that requires attribution. Is a CC-BY-SA-3.0 required or is the CC-BY-3.0 suitable? Would the released image be limited to the low resolution copy? This image has been published full page in a book and we don't want that high resolution image to be released. (Added missing word "we don't want". Swtpc6800 (talk) 14:42, 5 April 2010 (UTC) )

I have uploaded hundreds of public domain images but never one with licensing. -- Swtpc6800 (talk) 05:54, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

I would recommend the CC-BY-SA-3.0 license because it requires that future uses of the image also are released under the same Creative Commons license, but CC-BY-3.0 is also accepted on Commons. The photographer is perfectly within their rights to only release a low-resolution version with a Creative Commons license, but I'm sure we would love to have a higher resolution if they are willing. Killiondude (talk) 06:22, 5 April 2010 (UTC)
To reassure the photographer, no, (s)he wouldn't be releasing the high-res version. The only way people could get a copy would be by a) committing a crime b) asking the photographer or c) taking the low-res version and attempting to upscale it. Incidentally, 200x300 is nowhere near useful on a professional level - you could easily go up to 1000x1500 and still be sure that the newspapers would have to come to you for a full-res version for printing. Jarry1250 (talk) 14:57, 5 April 2010 (UTC)
CC-BY-SA is more restrictive than CC-BY; we accept both, so whichever the author wants. Yes, you can limit the license to the lower-resolution version only -- that is its own "work". You can't prevent someone from taking that version and upscaling it, or making other derivative works based on that particular version, but it would still be a copyright violation to use any other higher-resolution version without permission from the photographer. It would be a good idea to make that condition explicit in the permission section of the image description, to reduce the chance of someone incorrectly assuming they can use any version at all. And since this image has been published elsewhere, we generally require that an email from the photographer be sent to OTRS (see the link for the email address and sample content), so that it is not deleted under the assumption someone just made a copy and uploaded it without permission (which happens all too frequently), and would provide additional evidence for the resolution limitation. Carl Lindberg (talk) 16:04, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

Just need an image renamed

Hi all. I just screwed up when entering the title of a photography.

is supposed to be

I don't see any button to rename so I thought I should ask somebody here. Thanks Philippe Giabbanelli (talk) 15:10, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

The fastest way is to upload the image again under the correct name, and tag the wrongly named image with {{Badname}} to have it deleted speedily. Alternatively, you can add the {{Rename}} template to the image description page (click on the template name for instructions on how to use it), but it takes a bit of time for an administrator get around to renaming files. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 16:18, 5 April 2010 (UTC)
Thanks. The instructions of rename are pretty self-explanatory. I used this template since I don't see any reason to hurry about that coin (it's obvious anyway that it's not from the 11th century or else they were a lot better back then than I thought). Cheers Philippe Giabbanelli (talk) 16:28, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

Directionality of Hebrew upload forms

In the last few days i've been improving Commons' support for the Hebrew language.

I translated many templates and messages, but there's one problem which i don't know how to solve: The right-to-left directionality of the upload form.

For example, look at http://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Upload&uselang=he . The explanations at the top, which come from MediaWiki:Uploadtext/he are displayed correctly, but the form itself is jumbled. The labels appear to the left of the input boxes, which is ugly and unintuitive in a right-to-left environment. The colons (:) appear sometimes to the right of the label and sometimes to the left. The question mark icons near the checkboxes after the gray categories field appear incorrectly.

All the above is also true for:

This problem also pertains to Arabic and Farsi and probably to all other right-to-left languages.

Any help will be appreciated. Thanks in advance. --Amir E. Aharoni (talk) 14:05, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

Well, with "&uselang=he", the form looks good for me in the monobook skin. Labels are on the right, colons on their left, the fields are on the left. For "&uselng=heownwork" and other uselang-hacked forms, the forms indeed do look jumbled. It also looks jumbled in other skins, like vector.
We could probably fix most this in the monobook skin by creating MediaWiki:Monobook.js/heownwork and so on, based on MediaWiki:Monobook.js/he, which includes MediaWiki:Rtl.js, which loads an RTL css file MediaWiki:Rtl.css. However, such a fix would work only in the monobook skin. To get this to work in other skins, someone would need to write scripts and css files for these other skins; then we could use the same technique. In fact, doing this for vector seems to be rather important, given that we'll switch the standard skin in a few days. Lupo 19:34, 1 April 2010 (UTC)
I just did write MediaWiki:Monobook.js/heownwork and so on, and that indeed helps a lot. So, who has the RTL experience and the skills to set this up for vector? Or does the vector switch also include the new upload wizard? In that case, most of it is moot anyway (at least as far as the upload form is concerned). Lupo 19:42, 1 April 2010 (UTC)
Oh, it looks good for me in Monobook, too. It's broken in Vector. I should get used to mentioning that i'm using the Beta when i report bugs :)
I can try fixing RTL, but where should i look? --Amir E. Aharoni (talk) 07:10, 2 April 2010 (UTC)
I don't know. I always get confused on RTL wikis, so I can't do it myself. If I'd try this, I'd visit he-WP, set the skin to vector and the user language to Hebrew, and then get all the css files served. Then I'd do the same here, with skin=vector and user language English. Then I'd look for differences in the css served. Then look at MediaWiki:Rtl.css; figure out what exactly it overrides from the default monobook css files. Then develop an RTL css for vector on Commons, which is normally a LTR site. Possibly ask the author of MediaWiki:Rtl.css for help. Then test it by making your own vector.js include the new css just for you. Then debug. Lupo 08:54, 2 April 2010 (UTC)
As I have worked on MediaWiki:Rtl.css and MediaWiki:Rtl.js before, Amir has contacted me to help. Disclaimer: I have no knowledge in any RTL language at all.
I moved the inclusion of RTL.js from "monobook.js/XX" to "common.js/XX". That way it will be included for the vector skin too. Then I added code to RTL.js that removes the inclusion of "main-ltr.css" (which is always included by default also for RTL languages) and instead includes "main-rtl.css". For me it looks okay that way. But please review it. --Slomox (talk) 18:29, 2 April 2010 (UTC)
For what it's worth, the Multimedia Usability project is working on a brand new interface for uploading. We barely even work in LTR right now, but I'm confident we'll be able to deal with RTL better, using techniques similar to the Vector skin. (In particular, there will not be any uselang hacks like "heownwork"). I can't tell you exactly when we'll release, nor exactly when it will be RTL-compatible, but these things will be happening in the coming months. You might want to consider this before embarking on a major rewrite. We'll be demoing and doing some formal usability studies this month, although only in English. If you want to offer comments or be a part of the process you can get in touch with me or Guillom. NeilK (talk) 18:23, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

PD-US-1923

I realise this has been discussed before, but, thanks to some issues with harassment on en-wiki, I now find myself unwilling to ever edit there, making this a somewhat pressing issue for me.

There are a number of works which are public domain in the United States, because they were created prior to 1923. These may or may not be in the public domain in their home countries.

I'd like to suggest that Commons allows such uploads, with a large warning noting their PD status is limited to the US (Canada, and a few other countries).

This has been a long-standing source of controversy, but I now find myself in a situation where assuring I have a repository for such content would be a good thing, and I would like to appeal for a change in policy to accomodate this. Adam Cuerden (talk) 19:55, 4 April 2010 (UTC)

That would be quite a large change and probably would never happen. Commons' content policies require images to be free in both the source country and the US. If I understand you correctly, you're proposing that we allow all content published prior to 1923 to be allowed on Commons because it is public domain in the US? Killiondude (talk) 06:24, 5 April 2010 (UTC)
That is also my understanding of the proposal, and I don't see Adam Cuerden's reasoning as sufficient to change the current policy. If he is that vehemently set against enwiki, there remains the possibility of emailing the images to photosubmission@wikimedia.org (although that's backlogged about five months). Stifle (talk) 12:32, 5 April 2010 (UTC)
I don't think it's good idea, since Commons contents may be used outside USA too. And current Commons:Licensing#Interaction of United States copyright law and non-US copyright law serves this purpose much better then your proposal. Please remember that only works published in USA before 1923 is public domain in USA, not everything created before 1923. --EugeneZelenko (talk) 14:33, 5 April 2010 (UTC)
Er, remember? That's not what the US Copyright Office says: "Therefore, the U. S. copyright in any work published or copyrighted prior to January 1, 1923, has expired by operation of law, and the work has permanently fallen into the public domain in the United States."[6]. That works published outside the US didn't get treated as published works in the US is admittedly what the Twin Books decision says, but that's not binding on anything outside the 9th Circuit, and it's widely derided as bad law.--Prosfilaes (talk) 19:57, 5 April 2010 (UTC)
EugeneZelenko was referring to works created before 1923 but not published, i.e. the publication requirement -- those are not necessarily PD in the U.S., and Adam Cuerden's original post did use "created" instead of "published". Carl Lindberg (talk) 20:21, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

April 5

Question about CC-BY-2.0

Hi, I just recently uploaded an image from Flickr under "Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.0 Generic". I didn't realize it until I after I uploaded, what cc-by-2.0 meant. My understanding is "Noncommericial" use is not allowed and CC-BY-SA is required? The uploader originally had all rights reserved and I contacted them and asked if they could release it under Creative Commons, and this is the type they released it under. Should I ask them if they could release it as Creative Commons Sharalike? Thanks. MikeAllen (talk) 19:46, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

I would say yes. We don't allow noncommercial licenses here. Wknight94 talk 19:54, 5 April 2010 (UTC)
Yes, if they are willing. We accept CC-BY and CC-BY-SA; any of the CC variants with "NC" or "ND" in them, we can't take. "Creative Commons" is a term for a large family of licenses, but we can only take certain licenses from that family. CC-BY-SA is the more restrictive one, but it can still be used for commercial purposes. Carl Lindberg (talk) 20:38, 5 April 2010 (UTC)
It was a mistake. They are like me, confused by all the options and what they mean. They have released it under Attribution 2.0 Generic. So that would be CC-BY? I think some people just put under license "None (All rights reserved)" because they don't understand the other options. lol Thanks for the help. :) MikeAllen (talk) 23:44, 5 April 2010 (UTC)
BY = attribution (like in "this photo has been taken by John Doe"), SA = share alike, NC = non-commercial, ND = no derivative. --GaAs11671 10:21, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Most of the RTL problems are fixed

On April 1 i reported that the display of Hebrew in the Vector skin is broken because of flaky right-to-left support.

Now i'm glad to report that most of the problems have been fixed thanks to the efforts of Slomox, Eran, The Evil IP address and Yuval Y. Thanks to all of them.

If you are can read in any other right-to-left language - Arabic, Farsi, Urdu, Yiddish, Divehi etc. - please check that the interface of Commons works well in your language in the Vector (Beta) skin by selecting your language in the preferences. --Amir E. Aharoni (talk) 02:55, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

We, the user experience team, are so happy to hear that RTL display issue have been resolved by the effort by Solomox, Eran, The Evil IP address, and Yuval Y. Thank you for making Vector compatible to RTL languages. --Shuhari (talk) 04:03, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Category:Dubai Metro

I have recently uploaded seven own pictures on the topic of Dubai Metro. They show up on my list of contributions but not in the pertinent category. Why? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Robert Schediwy (talk • contribs) 17:04, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

I can see them fine. I think it was just a transient caching problem. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 11:39, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
I see them too. You shouldn't be putting files in both Category:Dubai Metro Stations and Category:Dubai Metro, though; Category:Dubai Metro Stations is a subdirectory of Category:Dubai Metro, so the more general category should be omitted. See Commons:Categories#Over-categorization. —LX (talk, contribs) 14:19, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Batch upload in progress

I'm currently uploading pages from The complete collection of pictures & songs by Randolph Caldecott which can be found here Category:The complete collection of pictures & songs by Randolph Caldecott. If anyone wants to help with categorization or improvement.--Diaa abdelmoneim (talk) 10:23, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Nice collection. If there was an easy way to change the thumbnail size on the category, that would help. -- User:Docu at 11:07, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Portrait of George III by Allan Ramsay

On January 21, 2007 User:Carolus uploaded this version [7] of the painting of George III by Allan Ramsay. That version remained for three years until March 5, 2010 when User:Shakko uploaded this version [8], which is clearly a totally different version of the same painting. The one originally uploaded differs from the the new version. His mouth, for example, is slightly open in the original one. On March 7, 2010 User:DrKiernan re-uploaded the version that was originally uploaded by User:Carolus . On April 3, 2010 I restored that version by fixing the color and removing white spots [9]. On April 5, 2010 User:Schtolteheim reverted my edits and put the version that was uploaded by User:Shakko, which again is a totally different version of the painting as uploaded by User:Carolus 3 years ago.

What I am trying to say is that a stop must put to this reverting before it becomes an edit war. The version I uploaded is a restored version as the one originally uploaded, while the version put up by User:Schtolteheim that was uploaded by User:Shakko is completely different. I sent a message to User:Schtolteheim telling them that if they want to upload that version that they should upload it separately since it isn't of the same painting.

Hopefully they will listen, but I am writing this so that maybe somebody can help prevent an edit war.

Thank you, Andrew0921 (talk) 11:37, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

To make it easier for our downstream users, the original version of 21:27, 2007 January 31 should be restored. All other versions (of the same and different paintings) should be uploaded under separate filenames. -- User:Docu at 11:48, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
I concur. Did Allan Ramsay paint more than one version of the portrait? If not, what is the provenance of the second version? — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 11:51, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

He made copies of the same painting, but there are slight differences as I've already pointed out. The second one is not only smaller and darker, but the mouth is different. The version I uploaded is the same as the original upload, I just removed some of the white spots that were all over it and I adjusted the color so it wouldn't look so dark. Andrew0921 (talk) 11:54, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

As you can see my upload [10] is just a cleaned up version of the original [11]. They are the same, just one is an improvement of the original. Andrew0921 (talk) 11:59, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

For many uses, an edited version can be interesting, but for paintings we should also have a version available that reflects the condition of the work when it was reproduced. -- User:Docu at 12:05, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
Sorry, I misread Docu's earlier message. Were your edits to the original image limited to removing artefacts that were introduced by the photography process, or does what you did amount to an "electronic restoration" of the image (that is, you removed flaws that exist in the actual painting)? If the former, I think it is fine if you upload the touched-up version. If the latter, then I think it is better if you leave the original image as it is, and upload the touched-up version under a different name such as "George III in Coronation Robes (touched up).jpg". The different version of the painting should be uploaded under a different name, ideally with information about when it was painted. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 12:09, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

I did an electronic restoration, but I didn't drastically alter it. I removed white spots that weren't put there by Allan Ramsey, and I fixed the color since it was faded. When Allan Ramsey first painted it there weren't white spots or faded coloring from centuries of dust. Either way, I uploaded my version separately just now [12]. Andrew0921 (talk) 12:18, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

I thought it was the fragment of big one, so i've upload it. Bad, that I didn't understand it is another, and didn't upload as another file.Shakko (talk) 12:29, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
Andrew – thanks. I realize the spots or fading weren't there when Ramsay painted the portrait in the 18th century, but, as Docu pointed out, there is value in having an image which captures the current state of the painting. Thus, I think that it is more appropriate to upload your touched-up version separately. Shakko – it seems the image you uploaded is a different version of the portrait by Ramsay. If you intend to upload it, please indicate when it was painted and the current location of the original painting, if you have this information. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 12:32, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
I've created Category:George III by Allan Ramsay. No, I didn't know about location - I've uploaded it using the bot from ruwiki as newcomer's PD-art.Shakko (talk) 12:35, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
ah, it's from Williamsburg, Virginia--Shakko (talk) 12:38, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Well I uploaded the restored version separately to be safe, it can be found here [13]. Personally I think the restored version should be used in articles since it looks closer to what Allan Ramsey originally intended, while the un-restored version should have a link to it if anybody wants to see the current state. Andrew0921 (talk) 12:43, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

No objection from me. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 13:19, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Also @ Shakko, the fact that it is from Williamsburg probably explains why it looks different since Virginia was a colony and they shipped a copy and not the original. Andrew0921 (talk) 12:46, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

No, it seems that Williamsburg's copy is a recent acquisition. See the first source stated on the image description page. It seems that Ramsay's studio produced over 200 copies of the original painting. Sorry, another mistake. The Colonial Williamsburg Foundation's copy was acquired in 1768. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 13:19, 6 April 2010 (UTC), updated 14:25, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Good, I see that the original version was was restored and that the other versions have been uploaded separately. I am glad this issue was resolved so well and an edit war was avoided. Andrew0921 (talk) 12:58, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Sestertius Coin

I am trying to find a front and back photo of a Sestertius coin with Castor and Pollux on one side and the city on the opposite side.

You come to the right place. See Category:Dioscuri on coins. --Jarekt (talk) 13:48, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

A problem with rendering an SVG

There seems to be a technical issue in mediawiki's renderer which creates a mysterious line above the text "First Temple" in this image. Please help me fix this issue. TheCuriousGnome (talk) 16:07, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

You can leave a request at "Commons:Graphic Lab/Illustration workshop". — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 16:35, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Medical Request

Please slow the speed of this "bird wings-waving, or put some warning on this: Photosensitive epilepsy
Regards, LianRad (talk) 06:17, 2 April 2010 (UTC).

As I've no idea how to "re-program" it, I've put a warning on the page and asked the last editor to look into it. --Túrelio (talk) 07:08, 2 April 2010 (UTC)
Thanks. Is there any way to put the warning before the photo? In this case I believe that the warning by herself could do the job. In general, is there any policy in the Commons that regard to such photos? LianRad (talk) 09:03, 2 April 2010 (UTC)
Re 2: Not that I am aware of. In my past experiences, most proposed "warnings" (though not for this kind of reason) were strongly rejected; you know, the "we-are-not-censored mantra". The only established "warning"-tag is {{Colour blind}}; however, I've never seen it used. --Túrelio (talk) 09:13, 2 April 2010 (UTC)
Yet, in this case, I think it's worth to try. Do you know where can I propose this? LianRad (talk) 09:40, 2 April 2010 (UTC)
Either here or at COM:AN. --Túrelio (talk) 09:48, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

I have reduced the frames from 32 to 15 and changed the frame display rate from 30ms (which may trigger epileptic fits) to 120ms. Is that any better for you? Richard Harvey (talk) 02:22, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

Much better. LianRad (talk) 05:40, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

Umlauts causing illegal XML according to W3C

Hey people, I am from Germany and we got a funny construction in our language. We have got dots over certain letters. Especially we do this for the letter u. Resulting in and the very strange letter ü. In the UTF-8 character encoding this is represented by two Bytes. If truncate a text to a certain number of Bytes you may cut it into two parts. And in the end you get an illegal UTF-8 character. The problem is that my sirname contains the letter ü, and so does my username. Mediawiki splits that way and creates illegal XML. And when I use a certain tool to extract some kind of information from the webpages on the commons, the XML-Parser complains about improper XML. Thus I reupload and relink until I am lucky and Mediawiki cuts at the right place. Somehow this solution to the problem is not very amusing to me.

The following image serves as an example of the problem explained above.

Note the appearance of the letter ü in my username Dirk Hünniger (talk) 07:51, 5 April 2010 (UTC)


You are talking about Special:Export, e.g. Special:Export/File:NuclearMedicineImageOfAHandAfterShadowFilter-2.png ? -- User:Docu at 07:59, 5 April 2010 (UTC)
No, it is the page you see when you click on the image. Copy paste the URL into the W3C validation service and you get:
http://validator.w3.org/check?uri=http%3A%2F%2Fcommons.wikimedia.org%2Fwiki%2FFile%3ANuclearMedicineImageOfAHandAfterShadowFilter-2.png&charset=%28detect+automatically%29&doctype=Inline&group=0
And you get error on line 204 which is an ü split into two parts.Dirk Hünniger (talk) 08:16, 5 April 2010 (UTC)
Not sure which line is line 204, but it's likely the one with the excerpt from the upload log. The text there is initial part of the first version of the file description page. It has some use when manually checking the upload page, but in general, I don't think it's meant to be machine readable.
The question is if it can or should be fixed to make sure the page validates. In general, it's suggested to use the database dumps, special:export or the api for tools. -- User:Docu at 08:40, 5 April 2010 (UTC)
Yes it is a truncated excerpt form the upload log. I am using the Special Export stuff too. But for this particular function I am using the Webpage as is. Dirk Hünniger (talk) 08:45, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

I agree that looks like a problem. I would suggest searching bugzilla for related bug reports, and if they do not have any, filing one.--Jarekt (talk) 12:39, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

I just did a search, and this looks like bugzilla:332. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 19:27, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

The deployment of the new interface @ 06:00 UTC, April 6

As announced last week, Commons will have new user interface as of 06:00 UTC on April 6. --Shuhari (talk) 20:43, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

Nice to hear that. It's not usual that I get excited before some events, but this time I really can't wait until it happens, don't ask me why. FYI, I've started a planning of the sitenotice at MediaWiki talk:Sitenotice#Interface change. If you speak a language other than English, French or German, your fellow language speakers and I would appreciate if you could help with translations. --The Evil IP address (talk) 21:33, 5 April 2010 (UTC)
Did you see the translation of sitenotice above grow rapidly? Cbrown1023 spread the word to the translator community. Thanks, Cbrown1023. --Shuhari (talk) 03:57, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

I take the liberty to post in this thread. I have switched back to monobook, but I would also like to switch back to the old edit form? Settings options are half translated, half not, and for some of them it is really unclear what they refer to. What settings should I use to revert to the old-fashion edit form? Thanks in advance. --Eusebius (talk) 09:01, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Go to Special:Preferences and hit "Editing". Uncheck the two checkboxes in the "Beta features" box. Regards, -- ChrisiPK (Talk|Contribs) 09:15, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
Thanks. --Eusebius (talk) 09:25, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
Donald Zackary "Zack" Greinke welcomes you to the Vector skin
Thanks as well ChrisiPK. I abhor Vector for its dumbing down of the interface, so being able to completely go back to basics is a blessing. — Huntster (t @ c) 08:28, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

 Awesome! --The Evil IP address (talk) 10:52, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

April 6

Freedom of Panorama in Japan and Expired Copyright

We have a lot of photographs of statues here on Commons, like one on the right, and other works of art from Japan, though the Japanese law says such images can be used only for non-commercial purposes, which is against the policy of Commons.

On the other side, Japanese copyright law says that all non-photographic works enter the public domain 50 years after the death of the creator.

How should we deal with them? Should we remove them altogether, or should we keep them when possible and also mark using {{PD-Japan}} and {{FoP-Japan}} templates? Is there a need for additional templates and such? Laitr Keiows (talk) 04:22, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Someone familiar with Japanese copyright law will need to confirm this, but it seems to me that the freedom of panorama rules can only apply to artworks such as sculptures that are still copyrighted. If a sculpture has entered the public domain because 50 years have elapsed after the death of the creator, then it makes no sense if rules relating to freedom of panorama still restrict its reproduction. I'd say there shouldn't be any problem with the Commons hosting photographs of ancient sculptures in public places. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 11:59, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
I agree, if sculpture is PD no need to speak of FOP. But how to indicate that on the description page ? --GaAs11671 13:30, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
Being bold I added a comment regarding public domain to the {{FoP-Japan}}. Laitr Keiows (talk) 08:13, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
I don't think the FoP templates were meant for artworks whose copyright has expired. I think the FoP template should be removed, while the "|author=" and "|date=" contents in the {{Information}} template should provide enough information to ascertain that the artwork is in the Public Domain in Japan (architect or painter or sculptor's death year + 50 years : Template:PD-Japan). File:Aritoshi-jinja (Katsuragi, Wakayama) komainu.jpg should be deleted because the information on the sculptor's death year is not provided. Teofilo (talk) 12:09, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

Why takes it so long..?

Why takes it so long after opening the edit mode before the toolbar appears and I can start editing? Is this because of the new interface?

Possibly. What browser and OS are you using ? And if you are willing to provide some details on the age/type of computer you use, that might be useful as well. TheDJ (talk) 11:49, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
I saw the same in the past few days. But not today (FF3.6 + XP or Vista). --GaAs11671 13:26, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
Same for me. Not very long, but slower, so boring when editing many photos. I returned to Monobook. Jack ma (talk) 14:38, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
browser Explorer 8, Computer HP pavillion dates three years next june, (what do you mean by OS?) only commons is slow, not wikipedia. I just found out that only pages I open to edit for the first time are slow, somewhat 6 à 8 seconds; the second time opening is normal. --Havang(nl) (talk) 15:51, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

For a possible fix, see #Problems with edit box above... AnonMoos (talk) 23:14, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Bundesarchive naming

  • My two pence : 1) 1st penny: I think there is already too much Bundesarchiv promotion on Commons. For that reason, removing the "Bundesarchiv" name from categories' names is a good thing. How about removing the "Bundesarchiv" name from file names as well ? Or should I name my files "File:Teofilo-xyz.jpg" instead of "File:xyz.jpg" in order to advertise myself ? 2) 2nd penny: Bundesarchiv files are sometimes crowding an existing category. In that case - in that case only - introducing the Bundesarchiv pictures as a subcategory is better than crowding the main category (as long as no better subcategorizing scheme is implemented : when a logical, detailed subcategorizing scheme is implemented the Bundesarchiv category can eventually be deleted). One should bear in mind also that, as the fist letter of the Bundesarchiv files is "B", these files are shown higher in the category page than the other files which begin with C,D,E,F... Z. If a given category is crowded with more than 200 files, all other files are moved to the second page of the category and become virtually invisible. Teofilo (talk) 13:58, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
I don't think that Bundesarchiv is promotional thing. At least this prefix will make life of Bundesarchiv files uploaders easier since it make file names more unique. Actually same practice is used for images form other archives. I'll definitely not support file renaming just to get rid of Bundesarchiv. --EugeneZelenko (talk) 14:46, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

File:Actinic keratosis on the lip.JPEG

I got email from medical company claiming that the picture is not about actinic keratosis or cornu cutaneum, but low quality image of keratoacanthoma. What's the proper way to deal with this kind of images? --Harriv (talk) 17:53, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

The first step would probably be to tag it with {{Doubt}}. You could also request a name change with {{Rename}}; unfortunately, there is currently no formal process for discussing a rename request on Commons, but I see no reason not to correct the name if there's good reason to believe the current one is wrong. In this case, the source article does identify the subject as "cornu cutaneum on the lip due to actinic keratosis", so it seems we have the word of one medical professional against that of another. Do you think the person who contacted you would be willing to let you post their reasons for claiming that this identification is wrong, or even willing to participate directly in the discussion here? —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 19:18, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
{{Doubt}} added. The reason is that "cornu cutaneum" looks nothing like that and there's error in source publication. So I believe we need some third party verification about this. --Harriv (talk) 09:13, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

Cannot configure external editor.

I am trying to edit my uploaded images and made a detailed post of the problem HERE. All relevant pages are on my watch list and any guidance and direction is greatly appreciated. Ineuw talk page on en.ws 14:31, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

I want the missing catscan button back

I want the missing catscan button back --Havang(nl) (talk) 06:54, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

See #CatScan_link_in_Vector_skin above. -- User:Docu at 07:20, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
I want still the missing catscan button back showing on all categories. Commons changes more and more into a labyrinth, I am not pleased about that. --Havang(nl) (talk) 10:13, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
There is a tab "CatScan" just on the right of "history" tab. --GaAs11671 10:59, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
Not in the "new!" mode --Havang(nl) (talk) 11:09, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
It is only present on C[[:File:]]ategory pages. TheDJ (talk) 12:20, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
--GaAs11671 12:22, 7 April 2010 (UTC) Can someone check the licensing of this screenshot,?
It's not on my catpages screen, why !!???--Havang(nl) (talk) 14:24, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
A browser issue? Which web browser (and which version) are you using? For example, Vector (the new look) currently seems broken with ancient browsers like IE 6 (the drop-down menu for extra functionalities, where the CatScan link is relocated when the browser window is too small, doesn't pop up). Works well enough for me with Firefox 3.x (I have been using Vector with Firefox for the past six months or so). Keep also in mind that in the worst case you can always switch back to Monobook in your preferences. -- IANEZZ  (talk) 16:19, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
Browser IE 8. Monobook? --Havang(nl) (talk) 20:06, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
Problem solved: I got to My preferences -> Appearence-> I switched from Monobook to Vector (default), restarted, emptied the cache and I got several menu buttons back including catscan and Gallery etc. Thanks. Where has been said that users have to change settings? --Havang(nl) (talk) 20:25, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
I read somewhere that only users who never changed the default appearance would be automatically switched to vector. But if you still were with monobook, it should have worked like before, so I don't know. --GaAs11671 23:38, 7 April 2010 (UTC)


Image:Jawad.jpg

What do other people think of this image? the long description is a bit odd. Amada44 (talk) 08:52, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

Sorry to sound cold and heartless, but this appears to be an attempt (genuine or otherwise) to elicit donations for the medical treatment or rehabilitation of the person pictured, or perhaps merely the use of Commons as a sort of blog: see also User:Anwer Pasha. Either way, these are not legitimate uses of the Commons. The image itself does not readily show a person suffering from a head injury, and so is not useful for illustrating articles either. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 09:20, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
This is my opinion too. well then, lets delete it? Amada44 (talk) 19:42, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
Go ahead and nominate it for deletion. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 04:22, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

Just want to make sure there is follow-up...

As per the thread above, I just want to make sure someone deletes all the photos in Category:Photographs from Dermnet.com. Thanks again for the help! ---Kilbad (talk) 13:33, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

The simplest thing would be that Madhero Special:Nuke his uploads, he knows them and can do this without reviewing them individually. The nuke is possible for 1 month, so hurry. Otherwise we can delete all files in that category and restore the 19(?) designated images. --Martin H. (talk) 14:59, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
I thought he has admin rights too, but no, so no "self" nuke. --Martin H. (talk) 15:01, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
Yeah, I think just deleting all the images is a good idea. We can re-upload the 19 later. ---Kilbad (talk) 20:27, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

Annotations

The change to the new skin made annotations on images appear bigger, making them more difficult to handle for a visitor, esp. if there are many annotations for a file [14]. Maybe the fontsize should be reduced. best regards, Alexpl (talk) 08:27, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

Actually, it's the other way 'round: vector has a smaller main text font size than the other skins. The text of the notes has the same size in both skins, but it appears larger on vector because everything else on vector has become smaller. Lupo 10:16, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

AJAX time lag

As far as I can remember, this is a new problem making the AJAX useless when newly created categories are concerned. Do you remember if there ever was a time lag in the past when you created a new category and wanted to find it again using the autocomplete feature in the search engine, or as I am trying to do now, when trying to move files into that new category using the Hotcats gadget ? Is it pointless if I report this as a bug in bugzilla ? Teofilo (talk) 14:11, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

The search index has always been slow to update, though the actual delay has varied from "not quite instant" to "glacially slow" and back over the years, depending on things like hardware availability and usage levels. I looked at the history of the HotCat gadget, and it seems it was changed back in late December to use the search index instead of list=allpages (which is basically equivalent to Special:Allpages). I'm not sure why the change was made (performance reasons?), but that might be what you're noticing. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 19:05, 1 April 2010 (UTC)
The change was made basically because people wanted to have some Unicode collation (i.e., on input "Sidl", also show categories starting with "Sídl"), which opensearch does give us. The downside is indeed that the search index is updated only in intervals, and you thus don't get newly created categories. It could be changed back, of course. Or made configurable, such that users can choose which they want. Lupo 19:13, 1 April 2010 (UTC)
It would be great to have it configurable. Teofilo (talk) 19:45, 2 April 2010 (UTC)
Bug reported at https://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=23101 Teofilo (talk) 09:19, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

Problems with "Nominate for deletion" function

Since today the function is not working propperly. The 4 tabs are opened correcty with the correct changes, but they don't do the "autosubmitt". I think the new "vector" changes are responsible. Even when I changed to the old monobook style, it doesn't work.--Avron (talk) 19:02, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

+ 1 - I have the same problem. I have no idea what a monobook is (and I do not want to know) - a DR takes much more time. Cholo Aleman (talk) 19:27, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

I have changed back to monobook, but it does not work either. Cholo Aleman (talk) 21:29, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

I don't think it was any changes made today that caused this. I noticed almost two weeks ago when making this deletion request using the "nominate for deletion" function in monobook skin, that the edits were not saved automatically like they were before. /Ö 22:23, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

This seems to be the same problem that I had for months last year. See MediaWiki talk:Quick-delete-code.js#Quick-delete gadget not saving the pages. I never found the cause or any solution to that problem. I just waited months until it miraculously worked again. Right now everything seems to be OK on my computer. Teofilo (talk) 11:18, 8 April 2010 (UTC)
I had similar problems a few month ago, I cleaned my personal subpages from bad javascripts given to me by others, cleaned my computer from temp-files, emptied the cache and things got right again. --Havang(nl) (talk) 18:49, 8 April 2010 (UTC)
You have been lucky. I think I had gone as far as uninstalling Firefox and installing it again. Teofilo (talk) 09:29, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

Follow-up needed...

Could someone please follow-up on this? A major clean-up is needed. All Commons:Dermnet photos need to be deleted except the few exceptions noted in that thread. Commons:Dermnet itself should probably also be deleted. ---Kilbad (talk) 13:06, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

I'm the OTRS admin who handled these images. I've already written a follow up to the copyright holder through the system in order to have that attached to the ticket, and then I'll work on deleting the images (or would it be easier to have a bot do it?). I can run AWB to remove the permission template and replace it with a no-permission speedy deletion template, or I can hand delete them one by one. I feel partially responsible, so I don't mind doing the legwork, but if there is a bot that could help, that'd be nice as well. -Andrew c (talk) 13:33, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
I think this whole thing was a misunderstanding on Dr. Habif's part, and no fault of any editors here. Thanks again for all your help! All the images in Category:Photographs_from_Dermnet.com should probably be deleted asap... ---Kilbad (talk) 23:55, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
I've deleted like 500+ images related to this. We have permission currently for 21 images, and I've made that list a protected page, just in case someone tries to use the category or permission template. Any more issues or concerns, contact me on my talk page. Thanks. -Andrew c (talk) 23:00, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

Just another crazy Bundesarchiv date

File:Bundesarchiv Bild 101I-301-1951-17, Nordfrankreich, leichte Schützenpanzer in Stadt.jpg is originally described with Ende Juli/Anfang September 1944 meaning from the end of July to the beginning of September, and the caption written on the picture frame reads 1944 Sommer (Summer of 1944). It turns out that apparently because the Summer begins on a 21st of June, the "|date=" parameter of the {{Information}} template has been "translated" into "21 June 1944"... Teofilo (talk) 09:20, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

Yes, thats a wrong "translation" in Commons. Better is something like {{other date|between|1944-07|{{other date|early|1944-09}}}} according to the description or {{other date|season|summer|1944}} according to the date field. --Martin H. (talk) 12:13, 8 April 2010 (UTC)
Thanks for pointing out this {{Other date}} template. I'll try to use it. Teofilo (talk) 09:48, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

Vector

I often use the gallery function under "my contributions". This seems to be disabled in the new vector skin. Can somebody fix it or do I have to set monoboook in my preferences again? Woudloper (talk) 07:51, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

I think there's still a tab that says "Gallery" if you visit your user page and look at the row of tabs. But perhaps somebody could make a new tab in the vector.css or whatever for the contribs page. Killiondude (talk) 07:53, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
There is a link "Images uploaded" at the bottom of Special:Contributions/Woudloper, is this what you are searching for? --GaAs11671 09:01, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
See #CatScan_link_in_Vector_skin above (comment from April 5). -- User:Docu at 09:14, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
@Docu: yes, same question. But I do mind :-).
@GaAs: The link under "Images uploaded" brought me to the gallery. However, I'd prefer to have it at the top of the page, under a tab again. Best regards, Woudloper (talk) 11:22, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
I knew you would say that ;-) --GaAs11671 14:27, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

Removal of Robert Goulet's Photo on his Wikipedia Page

The widow of Mr. Goulet has asked that that photo be removed. I am the one who took the photo, but it was someone else who added it to Wikipedia/Wikimedia.

Originally the photo was first posted on Flickr.

In any event, she would like it to be replaced, and I want to fulfill her wishes.

Can someone please help me do this ASAP??

Thank you.

Liz Kearley (Doxieone on www.flickr.com

We seem to have several images of Robert Goulet but I assume you mean this image. I did not look at OTRS but the file seemed to be released under CC license, so even if we delete it anyone has right to reupload the file using the same license. If Mr. Goulet does not like this photo than maybe a better solution would be to replace it with other photo like File:Robert Goulet photo.jpg. --Jarekt (talk) 04:21, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

YES, YES YES YES YES..... Please use that photo of Ms. Goulet on the web site from now on. He died in 2007. As mentioned earlier, it is his widow, Vera, who has requested that I ask that you remove my photo from the Golden Nugget. She has seen the notations here and is in free agreement that the photo you show above would be used instead of mine. THANK YOU. Liz Kearley

✓ Done all uses of File:RobertGouletMay07.jpg were replaced by File:Robert Goulet photo.jpg. --Jarekt (talk) 13:21, 8 April 2010 (UTC)
Should we copy this section to the talk page of the file? --GaAs11671 14:21, 8 April 2010 (UTC)
✓ Done good idea--Jarekt (talk) 13:11, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

THANK YOU for removing it from the page. Mrs. Goulet also notes the photo still exists here - the one that I took --- please remove it from here, as well. THANK YOU!! Liz Kearley

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Robert_Goulet — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.74.131.164 (talk • contribs) 01:27, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

Would you also delete it here on Flickr ? –Krinkletalk 04:53, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

Hi - I saw your note. I did not delete it from Flickr but changed it to "my view only" (private). Will this enable it to be invisible on your site, or do I have to actually fully delete it??? Will do so as a last resort. Thanks. Liz Kearley

FOP status unknown

  1. Is there something to tag an image as "FOP status unknown". If no (I don't think Template:FOP is for that, as is states "it is believed that the taking, uploading and reuse of this derivative work is permitted"), shouldn't we create a template similar to Template:Doubt?
  2. I think we should deprecate (ie put a "deprecated" tag on) Template:FOP, which is too generic, in favor of country specific templates found in Category:FOP templates.
  3. If you know sthg about FOP in Senegal, see Commons_talk:Freedom_of_panorama#What_about_Senegal?.

Regards. --GaAs11671 09:34, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

I disagree. You don't need tons of country-specific FOP templates. The FOP template is an indication template for downstream users, telling them that the work shown is still copyrighted (at the time the picture was taken) in its source country, is considered OK here because that source country does have FOP (or did have it when the picture was made), but that re-uses may or may not be restricted, depending on whether or not the country the downstream user is in has FOP. There's absolutely no need for country-specific versions of that, and there's no need to deprecate {{FOP}}. Lupo 10:03, 8 April 2010 (UTC)
The problem is that its text is really not clear about when this template is applicable or not, eg File:Orsay1.jpg (in France, no FOP). At least we should add a mandatory parameter for the country with a link to the correct section of COM:FOP. --GaAs11671 10:37, 8 April 2010 (UTC)
If you'd like to improve the wording of the template, go ahead. BTW, {{FOP}} is not a license tag, so File:Orsay1.jpg is missing a license anyway. And furthermore, in many countries FOP applies only outdoors. That image is just completely mistagged. Lupo 10:45, 8 April 2010 (UTC)
(for File:Orsay1.jpg, you are totally right) « In many countries FOP applies only outdoors », that's a good example of what I blame in {{FOP}}: it is a long generic blabla about FOP, but it doesn't say what is applicable to this image I'm currently looking at. That's why I prefer country specific templates. --GaAs11671 12:18, 8 April 2010 (UTC)
Or create a {{FOP-unknown}} for photos of works considered not out of copyright in the source country, but the source country is not (yet) listed at COM:FOP and Commons guidlines cant say if FOP applies or not. The template should have a parameter 1=countryname. --Martin H. (talk) 12:19, 8 April 2010 (UTC)
I'll do it. Thanks for the name. --GaAs11671 12:22, 8 April 2010 (UTC)
✓ Done Juridical English is not my cup of tea, so please improve Template:FOP-unknown/en. I'll do the french version meanwhile. (May be spanish version also, but sure not german one.) --GaAs11671 16:42, 8 April 2010 (UTC)
Please do not do so before adressing the question on the FOP talk page. Some relatively small or remote coutries can have un updated easy to understand well translated copyright law available on the internet, for example in the WIPO database, and in such cases creating a Commons guideline from scratch can be very easy. On the other hand, some countries have an "entry" at COM:FOP, but we are still at loss to fathom what the lawmakers of the countries really had in mind when they wrote their laws (for example the so strange laws of Tunisia and Vietnam). Teofilo (talk) 08:01, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

Future blues with DRs

We are deleting many pictures which will be free in some years. Should we not have a kind of template that enables to restore them automatically when the date of freedom has arived? --Mbdortmund (talk) 18:28, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

An interesting idea, but the problem is that the Commons would have to somehow store copyrighted images while waiting for them to enter the public domain, and this might amount to copyright infringement. (I wonder if it makes a difference if the images are not made publicly accessible.) I see a parallel between what you're suggesting and the lawsuits brought by the Authors Guild and the Association of American Publishers against Google arising out of the Google Books Library Project, which involved Google creating digitized copies of copyrighted works. The disputes ended up with Google having to settle for $125 million (see "Google Book Search Settlement Agreement"). Perhaps the Wikimedia Foundation's legal counsel should be consulted on this. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 18:42, 8 April 2010 (UTC)
What Commons needs is a "time capsule" feature, where you can temporarily hide or delete an image until a certain year. Of course this is somewhat dubious since the government will simply extend copyright terms again as soon as they are about to expire. :P Kaldari (talk) 20:07, 8 April 2010 (UTC)
The deleted pictures are stored on our servers anyway but invisible for non-admins. I think the idea of Kaldari sounds good, but there must be a script or database which handles the dates. --Mbdortmund (talk) 20:10, 8 April 2010 (UTC)
Deletion requests can be placed in Category:Undelete in 2011 (or whatever the correct year is). Pruneautalk 08:25, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
Thx , I will use that in future. --Mbdortmund (talk) 14:49, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
Even Category:Undelete in 2068 already exists … :-) --Rosenzweig δ 20:30, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

Problem with Gadget-UserMessages

Seems the gagdet is not working properly since vector, it might be unrelated still, I just don't know. See MediaWiki_talk:Gadget-UserMessages.js#bug_since_vector_.3F Esby (talk) 10:41, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

If fixed this, if an admin would be willing the deploy it. TheDJ (talk) 13:53, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
/me notes we stole this on en wikinews as fixed it for vector ~ 6 months ago. You'll welcome to steal our fixes. Bawolff (talk) 00:08, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

File Usage

Do files no longer list their usage on other pages besides the Commons, such as on Wikipedia? I find it useful so I know where my files are used, and so I can replace GIFs and PNGs on Wikipedia pages when there's an SVG available. Anyone else not seeing it anymore, or is it just me? Fry1989 (talk) 21:16, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

Seems to have disappeared... :/ Algkalv (talk) 21:25, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
See the "Global usage" tab at the top, the usage has moved from the bottom to Special:GlobalUsage, the "Global usage" tab replaces the old toolserver "Check usage" tab. --Martin H. (talk) 22:28, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
I see no such tab anywhere. It's not the tab that disappeared (leastaways, that's not what is being reported), but a listing available by default without any tab/link execution. Now, there is only an injected list of commons pages linking to the file. Previously, WP pages using the image were listed too, below the latter. Algkalv (talk) 22:41, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
Yeah, I can't find that tab either Fry1989 (talk) 22:51, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
For the record, I'm using monobook. Algkalv (talk) 22:59, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

Strange, if I log out and go to a Special:Random/File I still have the Global usage tab. Logged out I can only say for Vector skin but all browsers. Logged in I have it for both skins. Maybe you have some specials activated that hide the tab, dont know. --Martin H. (talk) 23:41, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

I have the tab in Monobook, but I must say this is an incredibly annoying change. It was rather handy having it on the same page, so I could simply scroll down and see the usage. Who must I bribe to have it changed back? ;) — Huntster (t @ c) 00:27, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
I hope your bribe is sufficiently high to get this regression fixed ;) Algkalv (talk) 00:36, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
Well, I could have guessed. The listing is gone (apart from the commons listing), and the tab you talk about is only available if JS is a) available, b) on. Replacing content with a JS doohickey... might as well convert the site to flash. How evil. How 1997. Does accessibility mean nothing anymore to W*? I'm lost for words... :/ Algkalv (talk) 00:32, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
Strange thing is using the vector skin on en.wikipedia global usage is where its useful at the end of the page, so if you want to view in situ then hope the image is on en. so it something they've set for Commons. I agree the tab is a backwards move and I'm willing to throw a few more sheckles into the bride to get reversed. Gnangarra 01:36, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
I agree, global usage should be where it is useful and available in any configuration, i.e. at the end of the file page. --Myrabella (talk) 05:16, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

 Comment I filed Bug 23136 - Regression: Section "Global usage" is not shown on Commons file page. Raymond 07:33, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

Thank you! Algkalv (talk) 07:40, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
Having this moved to a different page would be less bad if the link could show as a red link in case there is no global usage at all. Having the link always as a blue link, even when the page is empty is a bit disappointing. Teofilo (talk) 12:51, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
There is no "Global Usage" link or tab if the page is empty. Raymond 18:26, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
I think he means the link to Special:GlobalUsage that replaced the one to the toolserver not too long ago. (Was the only time before this speedy repair). -- User:Docu at 18:30, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

Okay, after commenting on Raymond's bugzilla report regarding the tab replacing the inline listings, Bryan Tong Mihn has stated that this is a bug and not a feature. So, hopefully we'll see a return to normal operations soon. — Huntster (t @ c) 15:26, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

✓ Done Fixed and live since a few minutes. Thanks Bryan and Roan :) Raymond 17:57, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
Fantastically speedy response. Thanks guys. — Huntster (t @ c) 18:09, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
Thanks everyone!Fry1989 (talk) 18:40, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

April 10

JavaScript to move admin tools from dropdown to tab bar in Vector

It seems many power users and/or sysops dislike the fact that Vector moves links to administrative actions such as delete and move to the dropdown. For those people, I've hacked up a quick JS snippet that moves all links from the dropdown to the tab bar (note that if the screen is too narrow or there are too many tabs, some of them will be folded back into the dropdown; this functionality was broken for JS-added tabs, deployed a fix for that just now).

The code is in my user JS; I didn't convert it to a Gadget as I don't know exactly how to do that, but I'm sure someone else does. --Catrope (talk) 11:53, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

Looks pretty nice . I see something that could be a little more optimized though, I'll test that right away and then turn it into a gadget. –Krinkletalk 15:28, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
✓ Done - It's in the Gadgets-section under the "Interface" heading as DropdownToTabbar. –Krinkletalk 15:47, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

"Hide bots" on Special:NewFiles

Why is "Hide bots" the default on Special:NewFiles ? I think files uploaded by bots should be watched even more carefully than those uploaded by a human user. Files uploaded by bot from Flickr happen to be copyright violations, especially when these photographs are derivative works of sculptures or paintings. Teofilo (talk) 13:22, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

The standard flickr upload bot doesn't have a bot flag. -- User:Docu at 13:25, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
I breathe again. Teofilo (talk) 13:28, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

April 12

GIF scaling re enabled

Last night werdna re-enabled GIF scaling. TheDJ (talk) 11:30, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Large animations now create errors. TheDJ (talk) 12:02, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
This is great. The scaling seems to be working for most images I looked at. A true test would be to remove __NOGALLERY__ from Category:Animated GIF.
  • Animated 120x120 thumbnail of 320x320 image
    Animated 120x120 thumbnail of 320x320 image
  • This one has some issues. The image has ~19 million pixels.
    This one has some issues. The image has ~19 million pixels.

--Jarekt (talk) 13:27, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Done. Seems to load pretty fast for me. -Nard the Bard 23:50, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
Some new changes were deployed last night.
  1. If an animation is more than 12.5MP total, you get a single frame
  2. If an animation is more than 12.5MP per frame, you get the thumberror.
Old thumberrors are cached, so you might have to purge the filepage. TheDJ (talk) 14:44, 8 April 2010 (UTC)
May be my question is stupid... what do you exactly mean for "purge"? (I still have some animated gifs that are not correctly displayed while scaled) --Aldoaldoz (talk) 15:09, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
To purge a cache means to bypass a en:Web cache. Either you have to purge the cache of the Wikimedia servers (button at the top right of the page), either you have to purge the cache of your Web browser (see en:Wikipedia:Bypass_your_cache. Dodoïste (talk) 12:54, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
In this case, it means purging the server cache. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 02:52, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

missing "Watch button"

Sorry, where is the "Watch" button? I cannot find it in the new skin, see [15] (perhaps different for others?) Cholo Aleman (talk) 19:28, 6 April 2010 (UTC)o

Took me a while to find it: you add a page to your watchlist by clicking the star in the menu at the top. --rimshottalk 19:33, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Thanks - I have resetted to the old version (monobook) - now it works like before Cholo Aleman (talk) 19:44, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

New "Vector skin" is far more better than the old one. All you grincheux réactionnaires can say doesn't change this fact. --GaAs11671 21:15, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
It looks nice. I'm sure new users will love it, once we get it tweaked a bit. But it hides some pretty basic functionality - the watch button - way too well. A star is not obviously connected to watching a page. Also, it shoves the administrator functions into a drop-down menu, which isn't good for dealing systematically with large numbers of issues. Adam Cuerden (talk) 21:20, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
The problem about the star icon was pointed out early: I really hope there's an option to move the watchlist back into the tabs. I understand they chose the star because it saves some place compared to plain text. I wish the usability team could find a better solution though. Dodoïste (talk) 17:15, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
) :) in ten month I will see the advantadges of the new skin toooooo Cholo Aleman (talk) 21:35, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

April 7

I need someone who can speak spanish

to look at this. We would need to write him an email asking:

if he is sure that the licence of his images on commons are correct (on the homepage thyey are licenced as Creative Commons Attribution- Noncommercial- No Derivative Works 2.5 Argentina License)

if he is the copyright owner of the images

if he would like to have all the images of his homepage on the commons (some are quite okay)

if he could upload those images without watermark

if he can send an email to OTRS.

The email can be found on the homepage. Whoever (speaking spanish) takes this on, maybe drop a note so the person doesn't get lots of emails of differnet people. Thanks! Amada44 (talk) 06:58, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

I'm Spanish, On can I help you?. --Ravave (talk) 15:12, 10 April 2010 (UTC) Do you need a translate English to Spanish, or viceverse?
I'm not Spanish, but we have a Spanish version of Commons:OTRS and also a Spanish version of the E-mail templates to give permission, see Commons:OTRS/es and Commons:Modelos de mensajes (on the latter link the first template is used for a Wikimedian to request permission, the bottom one is the one the author should fill in to OTRS). –Krinkletalk 15:15, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
✓ Done --Ravave (talk) 15:26, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
Also next time you can pass by Commons:Café ;-) --by Màñü飆¹5 talk 19:49, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

Glamorous link/tab gadget ?

The Evil IP pointed out the "Glamorous" tool in one of the talks above. This looks like a powerful and useful tool. Would it be possible to have a gadget providing a link in the left margin or a tab next to the Catscan tab/link ? I am using both the Classic and the Monobook skin. Teofilo (talk) 07:45, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

Would probably be possible to add it to MediaWiki:Extra-tabs.js. However, I'm not sure about the syntax of the script, so I'd rather have someone else with more knowledge add it there. --The Evil IP address (talk) 11:52, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
Adding to MediaWiki:Extra-tabs.js would force it for everybody. Since there are already so many in there, I suggest making this into a little script one can include or copy into your script.js (MyPage/monobook.js or MyPage/vector.js). I'm currently testing it. Will report back here when it's working good in both skins. –Krinkletalk 15:18, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
Gadget would be fine. -- User:Docu at 15:20, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
✓ Done - Use importScript('MediaWiki:Gadget-Glamorous.js') or tick the GLAMorous option in the Gadgets-section under the "Tools for categories" heading –Krinkletalk 16:56, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
Your gadget works fine in the Monobook skin. Thank you. For the classic skin, it is not the only link missing, so I open a new section for these links. Teofilo (talk) 16:20, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

Upload form errors (2)

Hi. I wrote here recently about upload form errors (2th April - the post is now deleted, removed or archieved). As of today, I've tested uploading and it still returns the same error: [16] I would like to know, if I am dealing with:

  1. Configuration error (Google Chrome 5.0.342.7 beta on Ubuntu 9.10)
  2. Software error (uploading not working properly)
  3. Problem of other kind - i.e. wrong settings in Preferences etc. I tried to check this but I've found no option to "add" "==Summary==" text automatically.

As an active contributor of Wikimedia Commons I must say these errors are terribly annoying when uploading multiple files via manual procedure with standard Upload form. After each upload I must make extra edit to remove duplicate "==Summary==" texts. Well that's no problem until you are working with about 20-40 files in a row. Currently Commonist is also down (about half of Czech Wikipedia's users is having problems with this script being unable to login) so either way I am dealing with these absurd errors when trying to contribute with new files. Could you please help me to figure out what the exact problem is and how to deal with it? Thanks. --Aktron (talk) 21:08, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

April 11

Mystery concerning sorting of subcategories

Here's a matter that's fairly minor but has been a mystery to me. Why does the subcategory "Category:Singapore Improvement Trust flats in Tiong Bahru" appear before "Category:Housing and Development Board flats in Tiong Bahru" in the parent category "Category:Public housing in Singapore"? I've looked at the sorting keys of the subcategories and they look correct. The problem doesn't occur with "Category:Housing and Development Board flats in Queenstown, Singapore" and "Category:Singapore Improvement Trust flats in Queenstown, Singapore", for example. Perhaps someone can shed light on the matter? — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 08:52, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

Both subcategories use the same sort key "Tiong Bahru". The software can not know that one "Tiong Bahru" should be sorted before the other. The actual sort order will depend on the sorting algorithm. It might depend on things like in which order the categories were added to the database, or it could be random which subacategory is first. /Ö 09:57, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
Ah, interesting. I recall creating "Singapore Improvement Trust flats in Tiong Bahru" first, and "Housing and Development Board flats in Tiong Bahru" later. I assumed that the system would sort according to the sort key first, then alphabetically according to the first letter or word of the subcategory name if the sort keys were identical. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 14:13, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

Is the new vector mode behaving as a mirror site?

Is the new vector mode sometimes behaving as a mirror site? I get strange lengthy page layouts and functions disappear temporarely (mostly hotcat and catscan). Also, editpages I open for the first time are still appearing very slowly. --Havang(nl) (talk) 19:09, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

Highlighting a row in a template

Is there a way to configure a template to highlight a row in the case one specifies such parameter? For example {{PD Egypt}} has 4 different cases in which a work is PD. Would it be possible to say {{PD Egypt|A}} in which case the first condition is highlighted?--Diaa abdelmoneim (talk) 09:52, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

Sure, that's possible with some template magic. Makes the template somewhat difficult though. Multichill (talk) 10:34, 5 April 2010 (UTC)
A complicating factor is that {{PD Egypt}} itself uses the {{Autotranslate}} template. Therefore, the required changes need to be made to the individual language versions of PD Egypt, such as {{PD Egypt/ar}} and {{PD Egypt/en}}. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 11:37, 5 April 2010 (UTC)
Probably cleaner to have a template per PD reason and replace all usage of {{PD Egypt}}. Multichill (talk) 15:07, 5 April 2010 (UTC)
PD reason? I'm not following. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 17:45, 5 April 2010 (UTC)
I think he means {{PD-because}}... but I could be wrong. Killiondude (talk) 17:48, 5 April 2010 (UTC)
I think he means each of the four reasons (A,B,C,D) a seperate template (ie. {{PD Egypt non-creative}}) –Krinkletalk 23:32, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

Default thumbnailsize

Thumbnail.

As you may note, the time of the skin switch was used to switch the default thumbnailsize from 180px to 220px. Since many pages required reparsing anyway due to the skin change, today was seen as a good day to include this change as well. Commons is the 2nd wiki (after enwiki) to be switched the remaining wikis will follow in the future. bugzilla:21117. TheDJ (talk) 11:27, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Most thumbnails used at Commons are in Categories, <gallery>-tags, and on a various logs. Neither of these seem to be affected by this change. -- User:Docu at 13:20, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
That's because neither is a "thumbnail" thumbnail, meaning the "|thumb"-parameter, like the one on the right here –Krinkletalk 23:51, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

Commonist and Google Maps issues

I am bringing this thread over from Commonist, as it seems to have wider implications.

The Move-to-commons assistant was not working when I had to transfer a file earlier today. )-: Nillerdk (talk) 11:13, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
It might be related to new login protocol roll-out yesterday. It sounds like a pywikipedia, AutoWikiBrowser and probably many other applications were affected. See more here. --Jarekt (talk) 13:54, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
So do we ask for a roll back- or is there a fix in the offing? Personally I have 103 images, correctly annotated and geotagged sitting on an open instance of Commonist (close it and the text is lost), a user waiting to view these and 30 others on a google map- and no idea of the way forward. As Para says the geodatabase is now working again, so commons is again usable. Irrespective of that, with a change of this magnitude special preparation should have been made. Users needed to be informed well in advance of the exact time of the switch over so they were logged out of the potential victim applications. If anything, a hat note would have been just good manners. The protocols for instituting such a change were in place when we were programming in Algol. Please tell me the lessons have been learnt- and give an estimated time for the restoration of services.--ClemRutter (talk) 20:00, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
Publicizing the issue in advance would have given more time to "prepare" for the change, but it would also have actually encouraged abuse of the issue. In such cases, the priority is always given to fixing the security issue first. guillom 20:43, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
Indeed, there is NO way this fix is being reverted. As per guillom, they couldn't really give any for notice about some (some parties were notified). And as per Roan (rightly says), the only breaking changes in relation to the API, will be in relation to security fixes such as this. The fix is relatively simple - Login once, get a result of TokenNeeded, use this token to then properly login. Reedy (talk) 06:34, 8 April 2010 (UTC)
Sorry, but could someone translate that into simplified instruction explaining what the user is supposed to do to get commonist to work? Esby (talk) 21:04, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

I currently have 30 files prepared in Commonist :-( I now consider uploading them to Flickr instead. --Kjetil_r 21:09, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

Announcement: I have hacked up a patched version that fixes the login problem.  « Saper // @talk »  20:04, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

Works well for me. Thanks! :-) --Kjetil_r 22:09, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

fyi and a question

w:Larry Sanger, wikipedia's co-founder has recently expressed outrage at some of the explicit contents on this project - so much so that he's written to the FBI with his concerns.

For those interested in discussion on other projects, there's a Wikipedia Review thread, and a discussion on meta currently active.

I raise this here as a point of information, but would also like to calmly ask of any passing editors the questions I recently asked User:Lar here - which relate to the uploading of illegal, or potentially illegal material here on commons - I'm trying to get an idea of how this community has dealt with such matters in the past;

  1. Have you ever reported material uploaded to commons to any external authority?
  2. Are you aware of any other volunteer doing so?

cheers, Privatemusings (talk) 00:24, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

  • No, and neither. As regards Sanger, the man should get a hobby. Paradoctor (talk) 04:40, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
  • No and no. And illegal in which jurdistiction, do US laws apply to a user or uploader in the UK, Japan or the Netherlands. And I know what the answer is going to be, the Servers are in the US so US laws apply, its the same question that is being asked over FOP with regards to buildings and public works of arts and which has led to the assertion that the US interpertation of what constitutes a PD artwork. With regards to art the US law is much more liberal as to what constitutes and so the community was happy to adopt the US standard even though local laws are at odds with the US interpretation. Just because something is legal in the US does not make it legal elsewhere and vice versa. Do we observe the most liberal law with regards a subject or the most draconian?KTo288 (talk) 12:41, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
Is there actually an easy way for schools to filter explicit images? I mean, yes, (most of those) images are educational but maybe not for all ages. Amada44 (talk) 15:02, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
As in, a way to filter those images through Mediawiki? It really isn't our responsibility to do the filtering...the onus is on the filter provider to do that, and I recall at least one company that has a filter product that supposedly detects the presence of humans in a picture and filters if X percent of the person's skin is visible. No clue how effective it is.... — Huntster (t @ c) 17:21, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
I don't agree if you are suggesting that WMF should not work with outside organizations and companies to develop effective approaches to identify and filter obscene, pornographic, or material not deemed appropriate for a viewing by all people at all times. As a high profile website and provider of free content, WMF should be a leader in this area. FloNight♥♥♥ 15:18, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
Obscenity and pornography are subjective criteria and thus can never be conclusively identified. It's windmill-tilting. A futile effort. And no image on our server is appropriate for viewing by all people at all times. Powers (talk) 23:55, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

Template:Divhide

{{divhide}} doesn't function very well in Vector. Is there any ideas about how to fix this? I'm trying to give vector a whirl because it will be made the default everywhere, and I'd like to see what the average user and logged out users will be seeing. That being said, I think it's mostly horrible. Maybe until all the kinks are worked out. Killiondude (talk) 06:09, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

I agree. The link to show/hide is visible only if parameter show=yes is specified, and in all cases you don't have the frame.
--GaAs11671 09:18, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
Correction: it doesn't work when "hidden by default" even with monobook. So this is not a problem of vector.--GaAs11671 09:22, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
I see the CSS styling is not present in Common.css at the moment. But how about the more in-use Template:Collapse ? –Krinkletalk 05:57, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
I think using template:collapse would be a temporary solution to a problem that would just occur in the future with other templates. I realized after I posted this thread that it was a css thing (well, Fran Rogers told me), but I was hoping somebody could fix it (I don't have enough technical knowledge to do so). :-) Killiondude (talk) 06:56, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
Has {{Divhide}} ever worked without the show=yes parameter, on any skin? I suspect not, since I don't think the NavFrame code it uses has ever supported a user-specified initial state. {{Collapse}} uses the alternative collapsible tables code, which does support it — indeed, looking at the source, it looks like the author of {{Divhide}} tried to mix the two syntaxes (unsuccessfully, as one might expect). Anyway, I would personally recommend just sticking with collapsible tables and avoiding NavFrame entirely: it does nothing that collapsible tables won't do just as well. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 17:27, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
Exactly, plus it is only in use on two pages (not counting test, documentation and inclusion) –Krinkletalk 00:13, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

Ugh, what's the problem now?

I can't upload new versions... It either takes me to the main upload form or get the annoying "file already exists" warning. ZooFari 00:03, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

Thats a problem I have too ;) --Martin H. (talk) 00:50, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
Me too. It's kind of messed up. You have to tick "Ignore warning" on the bottom manually. If you forgot, or it doesn't work (like I had) - just press Submit again, and (after reading the same warning again...) scroll down and click "Ignore warning and upload anyway". It's weird, and shoul d be fixed/restored a.s.a.p. but for now this works. –Krinkletalk 04:56, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

You know where the bug tracker is. -- Tim Starling (talk)

I've got the same problem, trying to upload a new version of File:Selected 5-year CDS.png. Rather annoying, as there are really historic events happening in the field of Greek public finance.;) I do hope this gets fixed as I've got rather a lot of graphs about economics and finance that I like to update regularly. MartinD (talk) 15:20, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
Don't know why, but it just worked OK.;) To whoever fixed this: thanks! MartinD (talk) 15:28, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
Still isn't fixed for me. I'm unable to upload over the top. Has anyone filed a bug report? Others may know where to submit it, but I don't. :-) Diliff (talk) 20:11, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

Watchlist my new files

Eh? The files I uploaded thirty hours ago went on my watchlist as they should. The ones I uploaded twelve hours ago, including File:Trinity Lutheran Sunset Pk jeh.JPG did not, even though the option still says they should. Jim.henderson (talk) 04:26, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

See #Adding uploaded files to the watchlist below. --GaAs11671 09:28, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

Search for deletion archive

I want to find the deletion request for OVChipkaart.jpg]] and the reason for deletion. When I do a general search for the item I dont find it. Of course I dont find it in the pictures, but there should be some trace of it. The only reason I discovered the deletion, was because a robot deleted the file in a article. Smiley.toerist (talk) 07:43, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

You'd go to File:OVChipkaart.jpg (located here) and you will see the deletion summary. It was deleted as a derivative work. Killiondude (talk) 07:46, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
In addition to the logs for the file, What links here can also give clues in most cases. —LX (talk, contribs) 21:01, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

scope?

I would say that these files are clearly not in scope. The images are have had a blur filter run over them for example this file exists 10 times in different degrees of blurs. Amada44 (talk) 09:23, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

Perhaps they might be useful for illustrating an article on the manipulation of images using software? — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 14:16, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
I guess it depends how it's being used (and categorized). I had added a few of them into categories about the painters, but it seems preferable to add them to categories about the technique (unless they are deleted). -- User:Docu at 14:22, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
Well, but 100+ images? I don't think that they will ever be useful. If you look at this category the first three images are of this wonderful set and they just cloging up the category because they have nothing remotly to do with Lapageria rosea! So they should be either moved to a cat like "image manipulation" or all deleted. I would go for deletion! Amada44 (talk) 18:34, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
I agree that, of the images I looked over, none had any real educational value. Perhaps you should start a group deletion nomination, while selecting three or four (or however many) that best showcase the blur effect and any other effects that might have been used. Deleting whole collections aren't often successful, but if you can pick a handful that have the best chance of future use, it may have a better chance at succeeding. — Huntster (t @ c) 08:29, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

Missing links in the Classic skin

I am missing "Contact us", "new files", "Random file", "Permanent link" (and "GLAMorous" when I choose that gadget) links in the Classic skin. Would it be possible to have them show up ? Teofilo (talk) 16:23, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

The GLAMorous gadget is using the addPortletLink() function from wikibits.js, which only works on skins using the "portlet" structure for their navigation links (Monobook, Chick, Modern and Vector). I wrote a quick experimental replacement for the Classic skin at User:Ilmari Karonen/standard.js. It's not very elegant, but it does make the link show up in the quickbar. You can try it for yourself by copying the code to your standard.js page. BTW, the same code ought to work for Cologne Blue and other "quickbar"-style skins too.
As for "Contact us" etc., those links are part of the normal, non-JS sidebar specified in MediaWiki:Sidebar. Unfortunately, the Classic skin seems to only use the first ("navigation") section from that sidebar and replaces the rest with its own hardcoded set of links. (I think it used to be all hardcoded, but apparently someone made it partially compatible with the more modern skins.) While I'm sure that could also be worked around in JavaScript, this is really a bug (or absence of a feature) in the MediaWiki software (and the Classic skin in particular). —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 04:10, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

rename

Could any admin rename this picture? --Ceddyfresse (talk) 20:02, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

What image? There's no file uploaded under that name. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 20:34, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
Because I just renamed it following the request at Commons:Forum. So done. --Martin H. (talk) 20:42, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

Error generating thumbnail

Heya, I'm getting an error message for thumbnail generation for File:Esja Þverfellshorn panoramic view of Reykjavík.jpg, namely the following: 

Error creating thumbnail: convert: Insufficient memory (case 4) `/mnt/upload6/wikipedia/commons/f/f3/Esja_Þverfellshorn_panoramic_view_of_Reykjavík.jpg'.
convert: missing an image filename `/mnt/thumbs/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/f3/Esja_Þverfellshorn_panoramic_view_of_Reykjavík.jpg/1024px-Esja_Þverfellshorn_panoramic_view_of_Reykjavík.jpg'.

Just curious, is this a known problem? -- Schnee (talk) 21:01, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

Thanks User:Túrelio — looks like this was a problem caused by a progressive JPEG. -- Schnee (talk) 21:12, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

April 12

Renaming files for typos

I've tagged a few images to be renamed because they currently have misspellings in their file names (e.g. File:Wigle Cemtery Harrisburg.jpg). The guideline for renaming files says that generally, minor changes such as these shouldn't be cause for renaming, but the reason for this seems to be that such a minor change doesn't justify affecting so many other projects; most of the images I've tagged are used only a couple of times in all projects. A few of those I've tagged have already been moved, so I'll get to my question: Should files that have typos in their names and are not widely used be renamed? If so, is there a general threshold for when a file is used enough across Wikimedia to preclude its being moved to correct a misspelling? Sorry for making this minor question so long! Many thanks, Wrelwser43 (talk) 04:22, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

I think files with typos should be renamed no matter how many times they're in use. We have now a very simple way of renaming files (previously, the file had to be re-uploaded by a bot, and the upload history was lost), and with the possibility of leaving a redirect behind, we are sure we won't break other projects of even links from the outside. So don't hesitate marking files for renaming. –Tryphon☂ 08:13, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
fixing actual spelling errors(not color <-> colour, ...ise <-> ...ize type changes) helps seaching, moving is a relatively easy task except that it requires admins to do the move and is regularly backlogged so it may take some time. Gnangarra 08:24, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

Impossible to update files

I have tried to update an image that is used to keep track of maintenance work on nl.wikipedia. For some obscure reason I cannot update existing images anymore. Annoying - Quistnix (talk) 18:32, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

Yes. This thread talks a little bit about it. It is in the sitenotice for English speakers, I'm not sure if there is a nl translation yet. Killiondude (talk) 18:41, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

I've read Commons:Project scope and your FAQ. So that's what your about. Now what do I do?

Okay. I've done lots of edits, and I think they've been helpful. But I thought you were an image hosting service. You are, but you want it to be educational. I just want to upload and catagorize nekkid ladies. So now what can I do--aside from modifying what I do here. Is there a free image hosting service where I don't have to give my real name and stuff and still upload pics of nekkid ladies for sheer gratuitous purposes? or should I just create my own site and take chances with the Law--they don't seem to like nekkid ladies much. All comments would be appreciate. Thanks.  :)  Better than Hustler (talk) 23:02, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

http://www.flickr.com. And no, Commons is not an free image hosting service - a website where you can put your images on to link or hotlink them from your website e.g. - Commons is a project to collect, describe and make available to the public in general and the 700 Wikimedia projects in particular freely licensed or public domain media files. -Martin H. (talk) 23:05, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
According to the Scope: "Wikimedia Commons is a media file repository making available public domain and freely-licensed educational media content (images, sound and video clips) to all." As for Flickr, I have to sign up with Yahoo! and that means my name, age, and ZIP. Thanks anyway.Better than Hustler (talk) 23:19, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
Nekkid? Oh yeah. --GaAs11671 23:22, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
Google Images has 255 000 results for "nekkid."  :D  I suppose Category:Nude women has perhaps a few thousand images--can that all be that useful or needed for the Wikimedia foundation? Now I can check out all the image hosting sites with Wikipedia articles here, and the several thousand Wikis listed here, but I wonder if anyone has something more immediate. Again, I don't want to give personal info--I don't here, thank goodness; and again, any help would be appreciated.Better than Hustler (talk) 23:51, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
99,9% of this images are not within our scope because they fail the freely licensed or public domain criterion. And: Please forget this ugly word "hosting service". Commons is a collection, not a hosting service. It is possible to hotlink from Commons, but it is not wanted, thats the important difference to a hosting service. Images here are not just hosted but maintained and organized by users, thats our project, not just the hosting of images. Additional you are not more private here then elsewhere. Give a random birthdate and email and you are exactly as anonymous as here, with one difference: At other websites you have full controll over your upload, here you lose all controll at the moemnt of upload, you cant delete something, you cant hide edits from the version history, your edit times are logged perpetually, your IP data is logged the same way it is on other websites - its not more anonymous then flickr over here, the opposite. --Martin H. (talk) 12:29, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

Martin H,
(1) Thank you for your continued commentary.

(2) I've done a cursory check of your userpage. Forgive me any extra effort I that may have necessitated from you, or might still be necessitating from you, and others, with my English idioms. Wikipedia:Dear Reader has a funny essay on this--and perhaps I should take it more to heart.  :)  

(3) "99,9% of this images are not within our scope because they fail the freely licensed or public domain criterion."

I presume that you are referring to my link to Google Images. The purpose of the link was to indicate the popularity of the English slang "nekkid" to User:ArséniureDeGallium. I had no intention of uploading them.

(4) I don't think I was referring to linking in my first post here. I was asking for comments and possible help. First, I uploaded a few images from flicker to here--and they were approved of; and did a decent amount of categorizing of many other files here. I don't think I did anything wrong--indeed, I think that by and large, I was more helpful than anything. However, I misunderstood the Commons' intention. I thought it was to collect all files in existence. But then I read that it's collecting for the purposes of helping Wikimedia--and a clause or two also suggests to provide educational materials (perhaps irrespective to WM projects). I readily admit that such was not my initial intention--though, again, I maintain such was mostly my effect. On this, I was eliciting confirmation, clarification, and possible exceptions to this; though I presume I'm correct in my above assessments here.

(Though again, how useful are, say, +95% of the files in this category?)

(b) Failing the above, that is, if I am to continue with WC, it is only for its stated purpose: then what are the alternatives? Now this is not to imply that I should never upload and edit here again. I could do both and fulfill both of our purposes (see Wikipedia:An interest is not a conflict of interest), but it would likely be more limited editting on my part. Where there is a conflict of interest, or more apt, conflict of intention, again, what are the alternatives (Wikipedia:Alternative outlets)? Are there alternatives?

Which leads to--assuming that there are no alternatives,

(c) Should I set up my own site? The purpose here is to download files from Commons, flickr, and others, and create my own galleries on my own site. Perhaps I could make such a site of mine user-generated; maybe even create my own wiki.

There would be no linking from the Commons, or for that matter much linking to the Commons--besides requirements by CC, CC-SA, and the like. I might, however, on other sites, such as forums, link to my own site, to give exampes.

Now before I do (c) (i.e. set up my own site) I should exhaust alternatives. "Before starting your own wiki, first see if others exist" (i.e. wikis with whom you share a common interest).

My posting here was done on the presumption that others might know of such alternatives--and I believe that a few still might. But failing that, I will go on with the searching for image-hosting services, which Wikipedia has been so good in providing a category of; and Wikiindex; before preparing to set up my own site.

"Additional you are not more private here then elsewhere. Give a random birthdate and email and you are exactly as anonymous as here,"

Doing the latter would constitute a violation of Yahoo's! Terms of Service.

"YOUR REGISTRATION OBLIGATIONS

...You also agree to: (a) provide true, accurate, current and complete information about yourself as prompted by the Yahoo! Service's registration form (the "Registration Data") and (b) maintain and promptly update the Registration Data to keep it true, accurate, current and complete. If you provide any information that is untrue, inaccurate, not current or incomplete, or Yahoo! has reasonable grounds to suspect that such information is untrue, inaccurate, not current or incomplete, Yahoo! has the right to suspend or terminate your account and refuse."

Just because I enjoy my privacy (and my interests might be considered immoral to some) doesn't mean I haven't thought a fail deal about the ethics of agreeing to Terms of Service and then violating them. (More disclosure: I've done it in the past, but am less at ease now in doing so now.) It is for such reasons that I only lurk on Youtube, Facebook, and MySpace.

"At other websites you have full controll over your upload, here you lose all controll at the moemnt of upload, you cant delete something, you cant hide edits from the version history, your edit times are logged perpetually, your IP data is logged the same way it is on other websites - its not more anonymous then flickr over here, the opposite."

True in many ways. However, I can maintain a fair amount of anonymity here without violating WC policy.

Again, that you for your time and effort.
Better than Hustler (talk) 19:15, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

Your stated goals are not compatible with the mission and scope of Commons. Nor is it our job to help you find a place to anonymously host your gallery images. We are not an image hosting service. Please take your efforts elsewhere. Thanks. Kaldari (talk) 20:04, 8 April 2010 (UTC)
Gee Kaldari, why don't you just tell me to fuck off: it would hardly be less polite than your above post.   >:-/

"Your stated goals are not compatible with the mission and scope of Commons."
Please elaborate--and something more than a terse finger-wagging.

"Nor is it our job to help you find a place to anonymously host your gallery images."
It ain't your "job" to do anything here: we're all volunteers. I was just asking for some help. Martin H, to his credit made a decent attempt. You aren't even trying--indeed, your first sentence, perhaps being inaccurate, is the opposite if taken unquestionably. I'm not even sure you read my post in its entirety, much less the links.

"We are not an image hosting service."
Wikicommons hosts images for the service of WM--and, implicitely, by a few of the clauses in the Scope, non-WM educational purposes, and thus, strongly, if indirectly, is of service to humanity, ergo it's an image hosting service--albiet with notable differences than the typical ones.

"Please take your efforts elsewhere."
If that 'tude (i.e. attitude) is common here, I might as well. Should I form my own site and wiki, I might mention you as the "clincher" (i.e. an additional consideration that lead to an immediate resolution to deliberation).

"Thanks."
Yeah, whatever.

Sorry about crashing your party.

"Don't judge a book just by the cover
Unless you cover just another"
EMI orchestral - The Sex Pistols.
Would you be playing the role of Bill Grundy here?   :-/   Better than Hustler (talk) 15:33, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

There was already a discussion about the growing number of explicite nude images, see http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Village_pump/Archive/2010Jan#continued_growth_in_sexually_explicit_images - in my opinion it is really a questionable point (hard to say "How much nudity is in scope?"), and there are other users (I know one case with 10 to 20 images) who use the commons as a hosting service for nudity because it is uncensored. Cholo Aleman (talk) 13:37, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

I had started a similar thread without noticing this post first. I have proposed a solution that should be acceptable to almost everyone. Link is [17]. - Stillwaterising (talk) 03:37, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
Please see this discussion which is currently ongoing. Kaldari (talk) 15:45, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
I did, and I've commented. However, the question of could different purposes serve similar goals, and if not, what are the alternatives might be best answered here. You know Kaldari, your terseness and misrepresentations of me, and a few sympathizers I'm getting on my talk page, are doing a fair bit to answer my questions. Maybe I should stick around. Please check my contributions and revert and delete at will. Perhaps do it without an explanation save for terse condescending remarks. I'll likely find it more revealing than anything.  :-D  Better than Hustler (talk) 17:52, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

Without wishing to intentionally muddy the waters, I've had a look at many (but admittedly not all) of Better than Hustler's uploads. Most of them seem to fit perfectly well within the "Useful to a Wikimedia project or otherwise educational" (paraphrased) scope of commons. While Commons is not a free image host for any random photo (like Flikr is), when users wish to use us to host photos that are in scope I see no reason to drive them away. Even if the goals of that user are not what we would ideally like them to be, when those goals are not incompatible with our goals (and uploading and organising photographs that are in scope is certainly compatible with our aim) then both we and the user benefit. If any particular image uploaded is outside of scope (for whatever reason) then it can be nominated for deletion and discussed in a civil manner so that, if the community decides that we don't want or need that image, then the uploader can learn why and not upload similar images in future. There seems to be a huge double standard when it comes to images that some people don't like because they contain sexual activities and/or nudity - there are plenty of users who are only here to upload their photos of trains/cars/tin cans/tourist destinations/you name it, but as their images are within scope we don't object. Thryduulf (talk) 23:20, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

Thank you Thryduulf. You haven't muddied the waters. Indeed, your contribution has helped in clearing them.   :-)  Better than Hustler (talk) 13:51, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

April 8

Tropenmuseum images could be at a significantly higher resolution

I recommend you read the comments in this first.

As described in this featured picture candidate, the images from Tropenmuseum could be significantly larger, as copies already exist of them in the larger format online. The following is quoted from the afore mention featured picture candidate:

“ Following the link credited for the images source (Collectie Stichting Nationaal Museum van Wereldculturen) there is a larger copy of the image on that page (you can find a direct link to it looking at the source code) - http://collectie.tropenmuseum.nl/imageproxy.asp?server=collectie.tropenmuseum.nl&port=20980&filename=\G%20schijf\TMSMedia\images\screen\60016824.jpg (don't know how long this link will be active) this copy of the image is much larger at 1,121px × 1,500px which puts it nearly at 1.7Mpx - nearly the 2Mpx advised for a Featured Picture. I don't know the legal side of this - if the picture is entirely in the public domain then uploading this image is fine, however if just the smaller resolution image is in the public domain then this obviously can't be uploaded, which is a shame. It may be that the bot which is uploading all of these images (all 35,000 of them), is uploading them at a smaller resolution than is available - in which case it looks like the bot will need to be reprogrammed. I think I'll raise this issue at the Village Pump. -- 77.86.89.44 04:03, 9 April 2010 (UTC))”

Is it legal to upload these images in a larger resolution? If so can we write a bot to do so?

I don't think that it would be that hard to write a bot to do this, as to go to a higher resolution copy of any Tropenmuseum image, you simply navigate to http://collectie.tropenmuseum.nl/imageproxy.asp?server=collectie.tropenmuseum.nl&port=20980&filename=\G%20schijf\TMSMedia\images\screen\60016824.jpg replacing "60016824" with the unique numeric ID of the image. -- 77.86.89.44 04:24, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

In this specific case, they mentioned as photographer G.F.J. (Georg Friedrich Johannes) Bley, 1855-1944. Since he died less than 70 years ago, the rights are not yet automatically public domain (PD). If the Tropenmuseum releases under CC-BY-SA license a file in a lower resolution of picture that is not yet PD then that doesn't mean we can decide to upload here a picture of the same phote in a higher resolution. - Robotje (talk) 08:11, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
That is correct. I believe we have to make due with the lower res images authorized by the Tropenmuseum, unless any of the images are public domain. Kaldari (talk) 19:42, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
We got permission for the lower resolution versions. We do sometimes get higher resolution versions on request. I'll see if they're willing to release a high resolution version of this image for restoration. Multichill (talk) 23:51, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

scaling gif

The three GIFs in this article of itwiki don't work properly and just a single frame is showed. I assume this is related with the scaling (as suggested above), but it's not clear to me how this problem could be solved. I tried to purge the filepage, but it didn't solve the problem, can anybody help me to fix it? Thanks,--Sandro (talk) 00:25, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

That means the animation is too large to be scaled. Either include it in the article unscaled, convert the animation to an ogg theora video, or reduce the size of the animation manually. TheDJ (talk) 17:12, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
Thanks, but the dimension of the file is not so big: the first one is just 239 KB, I don't know how many pixels it has but I guess not too many! Anyway, probably the best thing to do is modify the image and upload it agian. Thanks for your help,--Sandro (talk) 17:25, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
As for File:Regular_Pentagon_Inscribed_in_a_Circle.gif it is 480 pixels width × 480 pixels height × 164 frames, which multiplies out to 37,785,600 -- which is three times larger than the currently-declared "magic number" of 12,500,000 -- AnonMoos (talk) 08:32, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
It is not about filesize, it is about imagesize. If a GIF is too large, only the first frame is thumbed. You can verify this by checking that an unscaled version of the image will animate: File:Regular_Pentagon_Inscribed_in_a_Circle.gif. See also: Commons:Village_pump#GIF_scaling_re_enabled. TheDJ (talk) 23:47, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
Ok, now it's very clear, thanks. Anyway, I have a consideration: isn't this a major problem? I guess there are many animation around the various wikipedias that are not working! --Sandro (talk) 09:05, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
Support for animated GIF scaling in MediaWiki has always been patchy: sometimes they weren't scaled at all, sometimes the scaling was buggy, sometimes the scaling worked but brought the image servers to their knees. The recommendation has always been to upload optimized animations at the exact size they're intended to be shown at. I'd say the current situation is about as good as it has ever been: most animations are scaled, the ones the aren't still get at least a static thumbnail, and the servers aren't groaning at being made to scale multi-megabyte animations. Now if we could still get the scaled animations properly optimized, everything would be great. Actually, with modern versions of ImageMagick that shouldn't be too hard... —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 02:05, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

Possible issues with Van Maele/other child-depicting pornographic content

As brought up at Meta: Sanger's Message to the FBI, there may be issues with the Van Maele line art, and other pornographic art, hosted in Category: Pedophilia. It is discussed, on that same page, that these images may be of historical interest. While they may be, we need to decided if we actually need the volume of images that we do. One work by the artist should be sufficient to demonstrate his work, and yet we have fourteen. The other content (Russianboy4.jpg and Zichy Mihály rajz.jpg) may also be questionable. I think a conclusion needs to be reached. (As a footnote, I don't believe that Category: Lolicon contains explicit enough material to warrant removal) --Blah2 (talk) 14:55, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

If our lawyers advise us that these are illegal (or even "quite possibly illegal") we should take them all down. Otherwise, as for any other notable artist, we should be hosting as many of these images as we can get. I don't really see a middle ground. Commons, unlike Wikipedia, is not simply trying to be "sufficient to demonstrate [an artist's] work": we're trying to be a repository of images of potentially educational or similar value. - Jmabel ! talk 17:31, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
And is it for Category:Nude children ? You welcome, thank FrankyLeRoutier (talk) 10:47, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
Virtually all the material in Category:Nude children either come from a Dutch museum or archives of the German federal government. It's a bit much, but it's all completely innocuous.--Prosfilaes (talk) 16:24, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
The Dutch also have legal prostitution and drug use, that doesn't mean it's legal to do those thing in the United States. Wikimedia needs to very careful to follow all local, state, and federal laws. - Stillwaterising (talk) 02:07, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
Commons is an international project, and there are also strong first amendment defenses against defining innocent nudity as porn. If the authorities were to investigate some images, the appropriate information would be turned over to the authorities and that would be the end of it. There's no need to start 3 threads in one day on the Village Pump about this. -Nard the Bard 03:37, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
But arguably there is a need to find out whether there are any relevant laws that Commons needs to comply with (as discussed in "Explicit Images and Child Protection and Obscenity Enforcement Act") just as we have a system in place for removing copyright violations. I don't think it is an answer to say that the Foundation would co-operate with the authorities if they decided to launch an investigation. If that was the attitude, then we should allow editors to upload any sort of image they wish to, including those in breach of copyright, and wait to see if the copyright owners take action. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 04:28, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
It has been asked before, several times, and the answer has come back that our current practices are fine. Someone in another one of these threads has just asked again (within the last ~8 hours, so it's too soon to have had a reply). If you have problems with any specific image, then nominate it for deletion, and if the community agrees with you it will be removed. Until such time as our legal advice tells us that we should be doing something differently, there is no need to make problems for ourselves. Can I recommend that this thread be closed and discussion continue on the one where the legal question has actually been asked to someone who is in a position to give legal advice rather than this thread of uninformed speculation. Thryduulf (talk) 08:20, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
For crying out loud, a Dutch museum isn't going to upload child porn to us. Pictures of nude children with no sexual component are not illegal in the US.--Prosfilaes (talk) 16:18, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

Questionable licence

Hello!

The copyright holder of this image is obviously the "Ministry of Defence of Armenia". The used licence PD-AM-exempt cannot be used for photographs like this because it is no work of folklore, no communication on daily news or on a current events that are press information, no official document (like laws, decisions, decrees, ...), no state emblem or signs and it is no result obtained by technical means without the intervention of human creative activity. How is this handeled on Commons? Would fair use work here exceptionally? --80.187.97.80 20:01, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

If it's copyrighted, it can't be uploaded to the Commons. Sorry, but fair-use images are not permitted here. If you feel that fair use can be justified, then transfer it back to a language Wikipedia and use it there under a fair-use licence. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 20:34, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
I have nominated it for deletion. 80.187.102.43 17:21, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

Watch checkbox - wrong default value

I have checked "Add pages I create to my watchlist" in my preferences, but in spite of it, the propriate field in the upload form is unchecked defaultly now. It's some new bug. --ŠJů (talk) 13:34, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

Hallo! Is my remark unintelligible? --ŠJů (talk) 15:59, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
It is probably related to #Upload problems, #Bug relating to watching new files as default, #Watchlist my new files or #Adding uploaded files to the watchlist higher up on this page. /Ö 16:31, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

Impossible to download with Commonist tool

Hi, i would like to import 800 photos from Myanmar (Burma), some are concerning archeological sites that are just oppened for visit. I decided to use the Commonist tool, but it doesn't want to connect anymore to Commons. I don't know if it's due to the new skin or not. Any solution? Thanks. Guérin Nicolas (messages) 20:53, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

Please see Commonist and Google Maps issues, there is link to patched versions that is working -Justass (talk) 21:01, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

Commons:Oversighters/Requests/Tiptoety

I do not recall the template that is supposed to be used, but I would like to notify the community that I have offered my nomination for oversight rights here. Cheers, Tiptoety talk 23:57, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

For checkusers, the template is {{Current checkuser request}}, but I'm not aware of an equivalent for oversighters. –Tryphon☂ 09:38, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

April 13

William Warham, by Hans Holbein the Younger

I have a William Warham, Archbishop of Canterbury, drawing by Hans Holbein the Younger. And a hand written letter on the back of the frame telling about him. Can any one tell me how many of these drawing's exist. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.19.172.208 (talk • contribs) 11:36, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

This isn't the right forum for this question. I suggest you leave a message at "Wikipedia:Reference desk/Humanities". — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 04:31, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

NPD bot?

I don't suppose anyone's created a nice bot to add no permission/source/licence tags to a (long) list of images provided by a user, and subsequently notify the uploader? I'm getting tired of doing this and still got over 500 images to go. -mattbuck (Talk) 09:01, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

Also, do we have any means of auto-adding deletion warning to in-use images on other wikis? -mattbuck (Talk) 09:07, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

If you have a list of 500 images uloaded by the same user I suggest that you add NPD for one file and the add the full list below on the user talk: "Same problem with these files: (1...500)". There is no need to add 500 similar notices on a user talk. As for the notice on the images it depends... If there is a good chance that uploader will send a permission I would perhaps wait a few days so we avoid to add it on 500 images and then have to remove it a few days later. If not or if you think that it would be better to add that notice now it should be rather easy with a bot. I can do it tonight if you add the list on the user talk.
If it is not from the same user I think that a resuest at Commons:Bots/Work requests is the best chance.
I do not think we have a good "warning bot". Sadly. --MGA73 (talk) 09:53, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
I suspect that all or most of the images are from user:Duncharris, based on what I've seen on my watchlist the past couple of days. Several (but not all) have a wording in the description that says permission was gained from an email with an external link (I haven't checked where it goes). Presumably this email would need to be verified by OTRS? If so, could any user forward that based on the external link? Many of the images would be valuable if we can keep them, but the user concerned hasn't edited here since January 2009 and their last en.wp contributions are from 2006. Thryduulf (talk) 10:44, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
The few which do have such an email justification are in-wiki links, which I asked the OTRS people about, and they said that simply copying that into an email and sending it to them was not sufficient as "anyone could write that". I don't take this lightly, Duncharris has uploaded a lot of good images, but we can't escape the fact that they are almost all without evidence of permission, even if such permission was granted by email. Oh, I've notifed the en.wp wikiproject uk rail about the missing permissions btw. -mattbuck (Talk) 10:54, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
Ok thanks for that reply, I admit my knowledge of OTRS is very limited. Thryduulf (talk) 16:33, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

Testing Vandalism Image

I have seen this before. Just now someone replaced this image with this vandalize test image. is this a serious test? or a joke? Very strange is also that the revert was the first action of a new user?! I guess that user was probably from another wiki... Amada44 (talk) 09:50, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

Seems to be related to this discussion over at Wikibooks. One could call this "disrupting Commons to make a point", but at least it was reasonably harmless and apparently done in good faith to demonstrate a valid security concern. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 11:54, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

User:EngoziMfon

Seems to be uploading a ton of copyvios. Someone should probably review his images. Mangostar (talk) 16:07, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

Free pictures of not famous naked women photographed by not famous photographers

Hello,

Are these pictures within COM:SCOPE ? I thought they were not and for that reason made a request on Commons:Deletion requests/File:Fraulein im Bett 05.jpg. I was suprised to see many people say that such pictures are within scope.

I don't understand how family and friends pictures can be out of scope as long as they wear clothes and become within scope after they remove their clothes. Teofilo (talk) 11:27, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

This issue seems to come up again and again. I guess at some stage there needs to be a full discussion to try and reach some consensus on the matter. Because of privacy and child pornography concerns, there should probably be some requirement for uploaders to provide sufficient evidence to the OTRS system that the person shown in the image is an adult and has consented, and that without such evidence the image should be removed. "Fraulein im Bett" is a good example of why these steps are necessary because it appears the uploader had photoshopped someone's head on to a nude body. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 11:42, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
What I meant was "free pictures of not famous, older looking, written consent providing, naked women photographed by not famous photographers". Teofilo (talk) 11:52, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
Commenting on the OTRS business, this came up in January, and we have to realize that the skillset in approving copyright permissions, and the skillset for age verification are very different, and the current system and volunteers cannot handle such requests at this time. If community consensus wants to establish some system, that's another issue, but we need to get to that point first. Here is the past discussion. -Andrew c (talk) 16:22, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
fwiw, Mike Godwin (wmf legal counsel) appears to have explicitly vetoed the idea of OTRS working in this way, citing it as a 'bad idea' which wouldn't scale, and is not legally required. Privatemusings (talk) 21:26, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
"I don't understand how family and friends pictures can be out of scope as long as they wear clothes and become within scope after they remove their clothes." Heh, I'm not sure that's exactly the situation, but cleverly said. Actually I'd say that photos of non-famous friends and family can sometimes be in scope-- if they are of a certain photographic quality and can reasonably be useful to illustrate topics covered in Wikimedia, sometimes including fairly mundane stuff like types of clothing or common activities. There seem to be multiple issues regarding photos of nude people. On Commons deletion requests, I think a major dynamic is that we seem to continually get deletion requests from people who want to censor all nudity from Commons as being "porn"; I think this has helped develop a reflexive "keep" for nude images by some other folks in response. I think it would be great if we could have a serious discussion and attempt guidelines, I hope with the intent of raising average quality and illustrative usefulness of nude images on Commons rather than to eliminate or minimize them. Infrogmation (talk) 12:22, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
I for one reflexively close DRs with the reasoning "porn" or "not suitable for minors" as keep. If someone provides a real reason for deletion other than not wanting to see naked people, that's fine. -mattbuck (Talk) 12:40, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
This may also apply to DRs. --GaAs11671 15:17, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
I too would like to see some kind of specific guidelines established for what kinds of images are appropriate to add to our voluminous collection of nude female photographs. I would also like to point out that we have something of a double-standard currently. Commons:Nudity goes to great lengths to argue that, in most cases, uploads of penis photos are not appropriate. It then states that images of female genitalia are OK since they are not used for vandalism and thus the guidelines do not apply to them. Can we really justify this double-standard? (I imagine this might have something to do with the fact that 87% of our editors are male, but I'll refrain from jumping to conclusions). I would also like to point out that female nude photographs are by far the most viewed images on Commons (as of a couple months ago at least). I don't imagine that we are burning through all this bandwidth solely for educational purposes. I'd rather not see Wikimedia using up donor money (mine included) to further facilitate this phenomenon. I support hosting images with legitimate educational value, but I don't understand why we can't tighten our guidelines to filter out the cruft. Kaldari (talk) 17:51, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
Kaldari -- the "double standard" is that we get a significant number of photos of guys who shoot low-quality photos of their penises with cell-phone cameras while drunk, and then upload the resulting images to Commons, where they would rapidly become redundant with endless other extremely similar low-quality cell-phone camera photos of penises, if we didn't do a little judicious pruning. As a matter of practical experience and observed behavior, the problem does not really quantitatively manifest itself in the same form with women... AnonMoos (talk) 23:09, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
I agree with Kaldari and other that want to write a sensible guideline for deciding which nude images to host. Too often the not censored reason halts all discussion of the merits of hosting an images. FloNight♥♥♥ 20:14, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
BTW, I've decided to be bold and removed the double-standard from Commons:Nudity. I don't see any reason why female genitalia should be treated differently than male genitalia on Commons. Kaldari (talk) 20:49, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
fwiw, I think Brianna wrote the initial guidelines, and at the time there was a preponderance of penii (that's an interesting collective noun, and plural form, no?!) and not so much vaginal action - hence the emphasis, I don't think she intended a double standard, though I can see how one might have been perceived. Good to tidy it up, mind. Privatemusings (talk) 21:26, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
Is there a way of scanning a given category to find all used (meaning used on Wikipedia and sister projects) photographs ? If Cat Scan could do that, it could be a way of finding the legitimate "educational purpose" uses of photographs within a given category, and by comparison, to know if a recently uploaded photograph upon which doubts are raised, has some merit or should face an "out of scope" Deletion Request. Teofilo (talk) 20:35, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
That's a good idea. Perhaps we could create some kind of guideline which says that all nude images which are unused on other projects a year after uploading can be tagged for deletion. That should help us narrow the categories to the legitimately useful images, rather than just furnishing as cheesecake galleries. Kaldari (talk) 20:43, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
There's "Glamorous" for that purpose. However, please note that Commons isn't solely for Wikimedia projects, but also for other people. Things that aren't useful for the Wikimedia projects might be useful for other persons. --The Evil IP address (talk) 20:51, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
I think the "no images not in use in Wikimedia" is a not a good standard here, as it is not a good standard elsewhere. Commons often has categories and collections which are useful in providing more detailed information from a variety of images to suppliment an article that might just have one or two images. Infrogmation (talk) 02:03, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
Can you think of any other objective way to sort the useful photos from the purely gratuitous ones? I'm open to any suggestions, especially ones that don't involve subjective opinions and double standards. Kaldari (talk) 20:54, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
I'd say largely the same way we evaluate images of anything else on Commons: Quality and potential usefulness of the image. Yes, there can be an element of subjectivity in this, but that can be discussed and acted on per majority evaluation as is usual on Commons. -- Infrogmation (talk) 02:23, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
If the intent is to give guidance to contributors and admin then having something in writing is needed. In some instances, having deletion discussion about sexually explicit content plays into the hands of the people that want to shock, or are exhibitionists, or want to use Commons as a promo for a website site with explicit content. So, setting some type of good guide for contributors and admins upfront has the advantage of eliminating (or a least reducing) this possibility. Additionally, if there are issues with personality rights or age of the person, then highlighting the image in deletion discussions is problematic, too. So, I think that the tighter that we can make the written guidelines, then it is better for everyone involved. FloNight♥♥♥ 15:47, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
  •  Comment I think it is a good question. Not all nude images are in scope and not all family and friends pictures are out of scope. Each image should be evaluated to see if it can be used for something. If you have a picture of a friend with six fingers it could be in scope because of that (it is something special). Many nude images are deleted because many users think that we do not need 100,000 images showing a penis. Many nominations of nude images fail because the provided reason is "porn" or "nudity". Porn and nudity is in scope so it is not a reason to delete. If you count I'm sure we have more images of people with clothes on than of nude people. --MGA73 (talk) 21:14, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
  • What about having a bot that just highlights when an image is added to a category within the category:Nudity structure so that we can monitor when images are added to the cats, then admins can review those images speedy delete the poorer quality non-useful images without all the fanfare. As for defining poor non-useful images simple application of Commons:Image_guidelines#Image_page_requirements would be enough as is the case with COM:QI one editor gets its right 98-99% time. Gnangarra 03:25, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
I had started a similar thread without noticing this post first. I have proposed a solution that should be acceptable to almost everyone. Link is [18]. - Stillwaterising (talk) 03:39, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
Many nude images of non-famous people by non-famous photographers aren't in scope - some are, as an illustration either of the female body (which we have plenty of already) or as a demonstration of a particular style or genre of photography. These useful images are exceptionally rare compared to the redundant ones though. Dcoetzee (talk) 00:12, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

some more books without cat

somehow I'm not good at finding categories for books. could someone help me with this one and this one? thanks!! Amada44 (talk) 15:07, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

For scanned books some subcategory of Category:Scanned books is always a good place to start categorising. /Ö 15:13, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
excellent! I didn't know that cat yet ;-) thanks! Amada44 (talk) 15:26, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
I'd like to, but how does one add a category to this page? -- User:Docu at 15:23, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
Are you wanting to add a category for that specific page? To my knowledge, you can't add categories to individual pages in djvu files...the entire work is wholly categorised. — Huntster (t @ c) 17:17, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
I doubt there's a way to put a category on a single page of a DJVU or PDF document. But it should be possible to extract the image from the .djvu file and upload it separately (and then categorize it as usual) -- IANEZZ  (talk) 17:20, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
Addendum: I extracted the image locally just to try it out, but I'm not uploading it because it needs some restoration: there are several areas on the hairs, around the eyes and on the hands that seem to be transparent on a first sight (checkerboard pattern...), but are NOT transparent at all, and apparently have to be filled with more than one color. It's visible also in the Commons preview, if you have a close look at it. -- IANEZZ  (talk) 17:51, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
I had a look at the book with IrfanView. It allows to split the file into separate pages. There are a series of illustrations, but most have a fairly low resolution.
BTW, I discovered that Wikisource has a separate page for the djvu-page at wikisource:Page:Footsteps of Dr. Johnson.djvu/10. For other images, the usual approach seems to be to flag an image for extraction/clean-up and to upload it separately to Commons (wikisource:Page:Footsteps of Dr. Johnson.djvu/221).
To make it easier to find the illustrations here, I added the list of illustrations to the file description page. -- User:Docu at 14:09, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
The PDF version of the book on archive.org has higher quality images (not much higher). The strange areas I was talking about are most likely artifacts of the djvu compression. -- IANEZZ  (talk) 20:19, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
The image does look better in the PDF version (or is it my viewer?).
BTW it might be interesting if Commons would have subpages similar to Wikisource (or at least a set of thumbnails) for all pages of djvu/pdf files. Obviously, pages could be upload as pngs or jpgs, but this isn't ideal either. -- User:Docu at 02:55, 12 April 2010 (UTC), edited 03:35, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
Amada, a general tip: Start at Category:Books and add your book to the most specific subcategory of as many "by.." categories as possible. We have by author(1), year(2), century(2), decade(2), language(3), type(3), country(4), genre(5) and function(6). So adding Category:George Birkbeck Norman Hill is a step to categorize (1), you can create Category:Books by George Birkbeck Norman Hill once the authors category becomes populated. Adding Category:1890 books hits all three by time categories (2). Adding it to Category:Scanned English books give it a language and a type, so (3) is done. For (4) its an Category:Books from the United Kingdom. Now we have to know (5) the genre, but regretably the Category:Books by genre is a terrible mess and almost incomplete, and (6) if the book has a special function we can categorize that too. but I personally dont see the value of that by function category and avoid it. Note, that 3,5&6 can have an intersection with the country or language (e.g. Category:Novels from the United Kingdom or Category:Encyclopedias of the United Kingdom for genre and country or Category:French novels for language and genre), that reduces the total number of possible categories again. --Martin H. (talk) 01:42, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
thanks Martin for those very detailed instructions! This helps allot! Amada44 (talk) 07:01, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

Explicit images tag

I know we've discussed this over and over, but it's time we started tagging explicit images. This is not so much so we can put them all in one place in the hopes of a mass purge, but because I do believe, as a project, we have not only a responsibility to the readership, who make up the vast majority of users of the Wikimedia sites, but also to third parties to offer a simple way to block those selfsame images. I considered suggesting a separate category, but that would more than likely have the opposite effect of putting all of it into one, single, highly targeted category. Bastique ☎ appelez-moi! 20:19, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

Advantages

Disadvantages

  • Might relax the standards whereby administrators are comfortable deleting the kind of random amateur self-porn that gets uploaded daily. I don't think this is going to be a problem, necessarily. Bastique ☎ appelez-moi! 20:19, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

Discussion

I would suggest we take the standards of various other image hosting sites and decide on the one we like best! Bastique ☎ appelez-moi! 20:35, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
Perhaps we can draw ideas from Flickr and other sites. Flickr's content filter explanation page is here: http://www.flickr.com/help/filters/ Killiondude (talk) 20:59, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

I'm a strong supporter of this initiative :-) Hooray! - see Commons:Sexual_content#Proposal_2_-_A_sexual_content_flag for a similar proposal which was rejected - hopefully for reasons other than the merit of this necessary and good idea :-) Privatemusings (talk) 21:19, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

I am a bit afraid too much time-wasting talks or controversies could come as a result. Tagging, even if less radical than deletion, is a form of stygmatization. I also think that Commons being international, finding international standards could prove difficult. In the 1980s the 100 French francs banknotes were censored in Iran because they showed File:Eugène Delacroix - La liberté guidant le peuple.jpg. Teofilo (talk) 21:36, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

that said, we probably have common ground regardless, teofilo - for example, we could start with 'photos of people actually having sex' or 'photos which feature an erect penis' - maybe you could agree that one or both of such categories could reasonably be tagged as 'explicit'? Privatemusings (talk) 21:50, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
As I've said before, maybe not on Commons, we wouldn't be trendsetters if we'd be doing this sort of system. Google has a "safe search" so does Flickr. I'm sure if we review other sites' policies and come to an agreement of some sort with the community on Commons, we can work something out. Killiondude (talk) 22:06, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
No, I don't think we should tag them as explicit. Instead of using a euphemism, why don't we tag them "people having sex" and "photos with an erect penis"? Those are clear and unambiguous, and can be filtered as desired without having to filter all "explicit" pictures. There is no one standard of explicitness that can be filtered, and we shouldn't imply there is.--Prosfilaes (talk) 15:24, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
  •  Comment What is "not safe"? Some think that all nude is bad. In the US the F-word is bad so perhaps we should also tag any page that contains a bad word. Dead people is also something that someone might not like to see. And if you ask the Chineese government a lot of images could be bad for the people to see. Muslims (or some of them) think that seeing the faces of women is bad - we have a lot of images where you can see faces of women.
But to make this short I support a tagging as long as it is simple and does not mean that commons will be censored. Tagging images and/or categories might help someone not to see what they do not want to see. --MGA73 (talk) 22:09, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
Actually, if you ask the Chinese government, they're really cracking down on pictures of skeletons[19]. So do we toss all images of skeletons in the same pile as penises and breasts?--Prosfilaes (talk) 13:54, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

 Support I think that would be a really good idea. And in my opinion there is a differnence if a adult person sees an image of something his government doesn't aprove to children exposed to (for them) problemtic material. This (whatever it will be, template, ...) might also be an easy way for schools to filter explicit images. Amada44 (talk) 01:23, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

  •  Support, as long as we also allow such filtering for images of mohammed and for explicit language. TheDJ (talk) 15:34, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
    • Translated, I'm fundamentally against filtering for any reason, but if we offer it to one society, we should offer it to other societies. TheDJ (talk) 15:43, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
      • Reading my own comments, i feel the need to further clarify. On a personal level, I am heavily opposed to filtering. However, if others feel it will benefit the project, I will not oppose such a system. What I will oppose is that we cater to the sensitivities of one society and without giving other societies the same level of control over what they want to see. So that means, images of Mohammed, corpses, guns and images that might possibly be considered of a sexual nature. Oh, and images of gay people of course. TheDJ (talk) 20:07, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
  •  Oppose very strongly. Commons is not censored, and this is just the first step to change that. There is no universal objective standard of what is "offensive","explicit" or any other similar term. What is deemed inappropriate varies between cultures, over time, even between people. File:Erastes eromenos Staatliche Antikensammlungen 1468.jpg would be considered grossly offensive by some people, but I doubt that typical contemporary middle class white British opinion would hold it so. Many of that same group of people would probably hold the nudity of the young girl in File:NRT6 2001.jpg to be inappropriate, even in the same context even though in another contemporary west European culture it was fine. In Denmark, it is legal to posses pornographic images of people over 15 if they have given consent, in the United States it is illegal if they are under 18 - which law is correct? Some extreme Islamic cultures would have us delete all images of people as fundamentally offensive, so should we tag every image in Category:People or one of its subcategories as "explicit"?. Personally, I would much rather children see images in Category:Photographs of sexual intercourse than images in Category:Corpses but the exact opposite is true of many people in my own culture. In summary, I oppose this because it is impossible to be objective and neutral about what is and is not explicit. Thryduulf (talk) 17:30, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
    • I feel the need to point out that the proposal was to 'tag' images to allow others to censor, not for Commons/Wikipedia itself to censor per se. It would however become a possibility to do so. A possibility that realistically does not exist atm. TheDJ (talk) 20:15, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
    • The entire point of this proposal is to make it possible for each person to control the images that they view. There is no doubt that currently Commons is hosting material that most people would view as sexually explicit material that is intended to be titillating and other material that is disturbing to view because of the extreme violence shown. Other material is illegal in some locations under local obscenity laws. IMO, we should be alerting people that this material is on site and making it possible to abstain from viewing it. This approach is the most user friendly and imo would be in the long term best interest of WMF. You could still view the material if you desire but others could opt out of seeing it. FloNight♥♥♥ 00:28, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
      • At least part of my concern is that it won't let people control which images they view. This is an "explicit" tag, not "penis", "breast", "sex", "homosexuality", "corpse", "violence", "feces", "bondage" tags. If it's adopted by outside users, it will blanket-censor a set of images that may not match the cultural norms of the users. The extreme violence you mention has not been included in the list of things to tag previously, as far as I've seen, and while I appreciate the desire not to see it, it strikes me as mission-creep and not helpful to a clearly defined set of tagged images. There will be people who want to ban only sex, and there will be people who want to ban any nudity including the statue of David. I think we should shelve this and start working on a tagging system that might recognize that there's multiple norms out there.--Prosfilaes (talk) 05:34, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
  •  Oppose very strongly as well. First of all, Bastique did a very poor job of anticipating objections in the "Disadvantages" section above -- not a very neutral presentation, that. But quibbles aside, this is a fundamentally bad idea. It takes us down a very deep rabbit hole that we really shouldn't be in. Trying to define what "explicit" means is an exercise in futility. Powers (talk) 00:02, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
    • Your personal attack aside, the section was designed for people to add to it, since I cannot be expected to anticipate everything. Why don't you think about things before you put your foot in your mouth. Bastique ☎ appelez-moi! 16:05, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
  •  Oppose based on an undefinable term like explicit, espacially as it can be deamed to include unintended images.. I thnk we should take Quality approach and apply Commons:Image guidelines as basic step to eliminate the phonephotos and other poor works, but be definitive on {{Own}} and {{PD-self}} requiring that a minimum size of 1600x1250 px. We could also do with a Speedy deletion definition beyond "out of scope" so that admins can act judiciously with problematic images quickly. Gnangarra 03:59, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
    • I'd oppose speedy deletion based on any non-objective criteria. Even size would be problematic, as although a small image probably (but not definitely) wouldn't be much use if it duplicates something we have in a larger size, but we wouldn't want to reject a small photo of something that we don't have. We also need to be careful of what we consider duplicating - e.g. in some uses having a range of very similar images of penises that differ only in the owner's skin colour (even fairly subtly) could be required for educational purposes. Thryduulf (talk) 09:33, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
      • Now that we've heard from a few users who believe Commons should host every horrible image, without regard, let's hear from a more representative selection of, the community, and perhaps the readership as well. Bastique ☎ appelez-moi! 16:05, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
        • Please do not mischaracterise my opinion. I do not think that "Commons should host every horrible image, without regard". I think the Commons should host every image that is in scope, and that no image should be speedily deleted for being out of scope without an objective test of that scope. If it is not possible to determine, objectively and neutrally, whether a given image is in scope then I believe there should be a discussion to determine the answer. If you believe that "horrible" images are out of scope, then come up with an definition of "horrible" (preferably one that is objective, neutral and culturally independent) and we can discuss it. Thryduulf (talk) 16:28, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
        • Accusing those who disagree with you of not being representative of the population is a classic politician's trick. Naturally, the speaker always has general opinion on their side, especially in cases where it's hard to actually measure.--Prosfilaes (talk) 17:47, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
          • Most of the people on this project won't rant on an administrator's talk page to demand a response to restore an image which is quite evidently the type of poorly crafted amateur pornography routinely deleted on sight by administrators on this project, entirely within our guidelines. Spare us your ad hominem attacks. I didn't "accuse" you of anything, nor did my statement reflect your "not agreeing" with me, so your accusation of my performing a "classic politician's trick" is absurd. You know damned well why I stated the two of you don't represent the community. Bastique ☎ appelez-moi! 21:07, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
            • You deleted a file out of process, and anyone questioning that gets verbally attacked for it? [20] does not qualify as a rant in my book. I know why you stated the two of us (well, three now) don't represent the community; it's because you can't conceive of a community that doesn't agree with you.--Prosfilaes (talk) 21:24, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
              • "You deleted a file out of process" is untrue, and your "can't conceive of a community that doesn't agree with you." is an attack. Bastique ☎ appelez-moi! 21:51, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
                • What part of speedily deleting a file that had been nominated for deletion (and kept at a previous nomination) without explanation (at the time) and then retroactively suing Commons:Nudity as a justification when that explicitly prohibits the speedy deletion of images is not deleting a file out of process? Thryduulf (talk) 22:56, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
  •  Oppose on principle as obscenity standards are different all around the world. I don't see why we would want to create a tagging system, just because many US-based sites do. Also note that we are different than those sites. Flickr, YouTube etc. do allow to upload pornography just for the sake of people wanking to it. This is not what we do. We are hosting media for educational purposes, so any NSFW concerns against material on this site is usually brought up by people unwilling to see certain things because they are deemed inappropriate or gross or whatever. To put it bluntly, I don't see why we should care. We are here to educate. If you don't want to be educated in-depth about a certain topic, don't look it up. And @Bastique: You complain about personal attacks against your person and then insult the contributors to this discussion by telling them that they are not a representative part of the community? What is that supposed to mean? Are you implying that someone canvassed? If so, bring it up on and put the facts on the table, but please don't throw mud at people with a different opinion just because this discussion is not going your way. That is really below you. Regards, -- ChrisiPK (Talk|Contribs) 20:23, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
    Your personal and unwelcome commentary about what I said is a distraction from the discussion, notably as you are attributing an implication that this discussion was canvassed to me, when I did nothing of the sort. Furthermore I don't know why you believe something or another should be "below me"? You can attack me but I can't defend myself? Bastique ☎ appelez-moi! 20:59, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
    I am sorry, you are right, that was harsh, impolite and not a productive contribution to the discussion. I answered on my talk page. Regards, -- ChrisiPK (Talk|Contribs) 23:29, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
  •  Support Explicit <> Obscene. For example, renaissance era paintings of nude women may be explicit, but not obscene. We are not censoring anything by tagging the images as explicit, they will still have every right to be hosted on the Commons if they remain in scope. However, we are enhancing the usage experience of the commons by allowing people who have made personal choices about what they wish to view to feel more comfortable about identifying images that they do not wish to see. -- Avi (talk) 21:18, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
  • People who do not want to see explicit male or female genitalia ae likely not going to make the distinction between paintings and photos. Regardless, at least we give them an OPTION whereas now we give them NOTHING. There will be no change to the standard user's experience (unlike forcing Vector on all of us :) ) so I fail to see how this can be considered anything other than an improvement. -- Avi (talk) 21:47, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
    • That's not my experience. There's a lot of places I can buy paintings with nudes in them, or libraries with books of said paintings, that don't have nude photographs. There was a book for sale at many stores around here for girls growing up, with explicit illustrations; trust me, they wouldn't have sold it with photos. But for many people, at libraries, at schools, at work, that list will be used to censor Wikimedia sites with no option on the part of the user. I'm not at all opposed to giving them an option; I'm opposed to making it a binary option. Why not make a set of tags, so people who want to hide these images can choose which ones they want to hide? Why not do it right from the start?--Prosfilaes (talk) 22:24, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
  • I would not be adverse at all to having a small set of tags (e.g. partial nudity, full nudity, sexual activity, etc.). I would caution against it becoming too many. Also, I would still prefer the binary option to no option. -- Avi (talk) 22:28, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
  • So we will agree to disagree. Having an option, even if it is too restrictive or too broad, is better than affording people no choice at all as we do now. Furthermore, anyone can still choose to see any and every picture, so no harm is done, which is why I support the proposal. -- Avi (talk) 17:44, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
  •  Oppose Main problem I have is who would decide and how? A rather subjective schema of "explicit" could create more problems than it would solve. If an objective external standard was applied, and a system of review was in place (i.e. not just anyone can randomly running around on a bad day tagging images they don't like "explicit"), I would support as I agree in principle with the notion that people should be free to choose their viewing experience (and, more particularly, that of their young children). Orderinchaos (talk) 12:32, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

Discussion of tagging "explicit" images and or categories (arbitrary section break)

The gray areas in defining sexually explicit content should not stop us from addressing the obvious examples of it such as an image of a person putting a penis in their mouth or files uploaded for the purpose of showing sexual acts such as masturbating. The gray areas can be worked out through discussion as is done about every issues on Commons. Let's not dwell on the areas around the margin when there is obvious material that is a concern and can be addressed.

IMO, starting by tagging categories (or images in categories) of the most well defined examples of sexually explicit content will give us a way to test the system and process. Then it can be expanded to other categories. FloNight♥♥♥ 18:03, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

What wording do you propose to use to tag these categories or images? How do you propose to tag them? What do you propose to do to make these tags actually useful? Which images or categories do you think are "the most well defined examples of sexually explicit content"? Assuming you are talking about images of people "putting a penis in their mouth" (remember Bill Clinton said that this was not a sexual activity) and images "showing sexual acts such as masturbating", do you propose to place them in the same group, or do you propose different groups? Why? Do you have evidence that these specific images or categories are a concern to more than just a handful of users? Do you have a consensus that the system should be applied to these categories? Do you have a consensus that it should be expanded to other categories later? I strongly oppose any test of the system until all these questions have been answered, and there is a consensus to test it on a defined set of images/categories. I will further oppose each expansion that does not have consensus. Thryduulf (talk) 18:43, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
So, you are saying that category fellatio is not sexually explicit content, or are you being ornery :-) The increasing demand for proof of the obvious is not going to get us anywhere. I've yet to hear a good reason that changing the system to allow people more options for managing content is a true problem for anyone. The people that want to view the material still can, and the people that want to opt out can. This a reasonable approach that is used in many systems and if it is feasible to use on Commons then offering it makes sense to offer it. Feel free to object, but unless I hear a good explanation for why this is a problem, then I plan to continue studying the ways to implement it. FloNight♥♥♥ 19:13, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
So we should build a system that can't work first? Reasonable people design first, then build. A monolithic system is going to over- and under-block and be massively controversial. Why not design from the start a system that accepts the fact that different people want to block different things, which should be obvious? Other systems that don't take care to be uncensored, massively multilingual and multicultural are naturally going to work differently.--Prosfilaes (talk) 19:53, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
My comment was meaning that while you think categories like Category:Fellatio are "sexually explicit content" while others may not do. I certainly don't think that one tag should apply to both it and category:Masturbation. For example I believe that at least one interpretation of the bible is that the latter is sinful while the former is not, so it is highly likely that some people will want them filterable separately. Bill Clinton was making a distinction between fellatio and intercourse - are you? What about between File:Fellatio by sub.jpg and File:Blowjob.svg, can you see why some people would want to treat them differently? If not, then I don't think we will ever agree and consensus will never be achieved. If you do understand that people may want to treat them differently, and don't understand why we should work out how to do this from the start, then I suggest you read things like w:en:Database design (or to summarise: understand what you want to achieve before designing your system, and design your system before building it (as an aside, not applying this basic principle is what typically leads to all the problems with government IT systems that arrive late, overbudget and don't do what is needed)). At present I am not convinced you understand the points that Prosfilaes and I are making, nor do I believe you know exactly what you want. Thryduulf (talk) 20:29, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
That's exactly it, though; we don't want a system that gets expanded to other categories. There's no gray issues here; there are pictures that some people definitely don't want excluded, and some people definitely do. No one system is going to fit both requirements. Instead of a monolithic system that we constantly have arguments about the edges, we want a well-defined segmented system. Surely that's something that should be chosen at the start.
If you want to do it your way, then do it. Create User:FloNight/Sexually explicit categories and list them there. Any system that can handle a commons-specific tagging system can produce a list of images to block from that. You can have your group work on it in userspace and then present a tested system.--Prosfilaes (talk) 18:47, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
I'm eager to get going on identifying the categories that are obvious. I have an email in to an adviser about the legal aspect of working on this topic, and once I get a reply, then I'll get started identifying the categories that seem obvious. And then we can figure the best way(s) to let people exclude the content. FloNight♥♥♥ 19:13, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
I can't remember if you consider nudity something you want to tag or not, but doing so based on categories is very hit and miss - e.g. I presume you would not want to filter Category:Sitting women, but one of the sub-categories of that is Category:topless sitting women, which contains some images that some of those filtering nudity would want filtered. How will your system cope with situations like this? What about if you want to filter Category:Toplessness but not the sub-category Category:Male toplessness? Thryduulf (talk) 23:03, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
as you wouldnt filter categories like Category:Black, Category:Red, Category:Blue eyes the whole purpose of the filtering is sensible the mechanics are a little more difficult especially ad its moves further down the tree into detail. Its starts somewhere an at a wide point where the majority will be covered is a good place, the small details and end runs can be addressed if/when they need to be. Gnangarra 00:10, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
No, you need to define the detail first. Even such basic decisions about whether you use a whitelist or a blacklist? Do you allow/block all subdirectories of a named directory in your listing? How you cope with the fact that the category tree is a web not a strict hierarchy? If you are using a whitelist how do you cope with allowing Category:Sitting women while not allowing Category:Topless sitting women? If you are using a blacklist, how do you block Category:Toplessness but allow Category:Male toplessness? How do you set it so that people who want to block Category:Female toplessness but not Category:Male toplessness can use the same system as people who want to block both or neither? If different people cannot filter different categories, who decides what gets filtered? What criteria do they use? What happens when a new category is added, e.g. if Category:Female toplessness in Papua New Guinea were added to Category:Female toplessness (on the blacklist) and Category:Papua New Guinea (on the whitelist/not on the blacklist)? Do new categories need individual human review? If so, who reviews them? What criteria will they use? Thryduulf (talk) 08:28, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

Technical Aspects

How would such a tag work? - Would it be a template? Perhaps those with more technical bent could offer their technical ideas here so we can see how it might work? :-) cheers, Privatemusings (talk) 22:04, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

I think we should tag categories rather than images. That way less work is required and it is less likely that the tags will be randomly removed without someone noticing. Kaldari (talk) 22:12, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
In Category:Penis we have images like this, this or this, in category Category:Breasts we have images like this, this, this, this. Existing categories says nothing about explicitness of some file. Trycatch (talk) 23:03, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
All filtering schemes have false positives. The advantage of using the existing categories would be that it would require minimal effort and would be less likely to attract objections/interference from individual image uploaders. It's just an idea though. Kaldari (talk) 23:26, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
This scheme will produce false positives en masse. Existing cats can provide only very rough filtering, and tagging innocent pictures will be dangerous if somebody will use filter to censor Wikipedia without possibility to reader to turn censorship off (schools, etc.). Trycatch (talk) 06:16, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
I agree, tagging existing categories will be highly prone to false positives. It would probably be better to just put them all in one category. Or just adding a template of course. Possibly with instructions on how to use such tagging to setup a filter process. TheDJ (talk) 20:13, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

Adding uploaded files to the watchlist

Resolved

Is there a setting (or script) somewhere to automatically add all files I upload to my watchlist? --Kjetil_r 19:19, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

Does checking Preferences → Watchlist → "Add pages I create to my watchlist" not work anymore? Seems like it should, since you are creating a page when you upload an image, but with the recent changes this may either be off by default or no longer fully functioning. I do see that under "Upload file" that "Watch this file" is turned off by default, which seems exceedingly strange. — Huntster (t @ c) 19:36, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
I have Preferences > Watchlist > "Add pages I create to my watchlist" checked, but the images I uploaded earlier this evening were not added to my watchlist. Should this be filed as a bug somewhere? --Kjetil_r 22:33, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
Yeah, I would file a Bugzilla report, request that uploaded files be watched by default, as they used to be. As I indicated above, this default behaviour has apparently been changed. — Huntster (t @ c) 01:36, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
Indeed, it seems that automatic addition of newly uploaded files to the watchlist currently doesn't work, I'm having the same experience. Gestumblindi (talk) 22:07, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
Very, very annoying, and because it happened silently, it is likely to lead to a lot of completely unwatched files. Oh, and of course just for good measure, it happens at the same time that we make standard a skin that makes it less obvious whether you are watching any particular file. A vandal's dream. - Jmabel ! talk 23:18, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

This MediaWiki 1.16 deploy issue was fixed. TheDJ (talk) 15:06, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

Templates for smilies (an unimportant subject)

Hi guys and guyesses of Commons.

What would you think if I renamed the templates of Category:Emoticon templates with english names, and merge the duplicates, like {{Wink}} and {{Clin}} ?

I know that creating such templates is not a crucial objective for Commons, but, imho, smilies are very useful in discussions, as they tend to soften social interactions between contributors in wiki projects.

Waiting for your feedback. Regards. --GaAs11671 16:04, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

Personally I do not have any objection to the templates being renamed. However, note that the language policy does not specify that templates must be in English. It may be better to just create redirects with English names to the original template names. Alternatively, if you do rename the templates, create redirects from the original names to the new English names. As for merging some of the emoticons, I note that {{Wink}} and {{Clin}} are not identical, so I think they should not be merged. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 18:05, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
Of course I'll keep all the redirects. --GaAs11671 12:32, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
I'm fine with English names, but it would certainly be bst to use symbols like ;-), :-) and the like where possible because this is even more language neutral. --The Evil IP address (talk) 18:55, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

I like Vector skin

This user uses the new Vector skin and likes it.


And as I want that to be public, I just created this really unnecessary user box that you can see there on the right of this section.

Those who are interrested in making such stupid user-boxes are welcome to help me to make it better (in particular, a more suited image would be welcome).

Regards. --GaAs11671 17:37, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

I don't like user boxes that much but I really like vektor too!!! nice work! Amada44 (talk) 17:53, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
Vector looks oke and has extended possibilities, but works terribly unstable, is my opinion. Reupload function, hotcat , catscan problems, slow edit modes, etc. The problems dissappear when I switch back to the other mode. I don't understand why all these problems. --Havang(nl) (talk) 18:50, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
That is because every wiki has it's own slew of customizations which are not taken into account during testing. A 'reupload' issue is a problem with the software upgrade btw. It is not specific to the skin. TheDJ (talk) 19:48, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
(ec) Most of the editing and uploading issues don't really depend on the skin but on other parts of the Usability Initiative package; you can turn them off in your preferences and just enable the Vector skin if you like. As for JS tab breakage, while the Vector skin does perhaps deserve some of the blame (there are a few IDs and classes that were renamed for no good reason that I can see, like "#column-one" → "#panel" and ".pBody" → ".body"), mostly that just comes down to the fact that many existing scripts make assumptions that are only valid on Monobook and will fail on other skins. You can't really blame the Vector skin just for not being 100% identical to Monobook in every way, which is what 100% compatibility with all existing third-party scripts would essentially require. Things will get better gradually, as the people who wrote and maintain those scripts notice the problems and fix them. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 19:58, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

I just realised I forgot to supply a link, so here t is: {{User Vector skin}}. --GaAs11671 00:47, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

  • I agree with Amada44. Personally I got used to it fairly quickly. There are few issues with relative font-sizes to be sorted out, but overall, one keeps forgetting that it changed. (ok somehow I still miss the Cologne Blue skin, but that was before monobook). -- User:Docu at 00:53, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

I am porting this userbox to Wikipedia. And done! See here. :) Steven Walling 05:58, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

No big deal for some computers; just a minor issue of font size control and the subtlety of the "watched" star. The XP computer I'm on now, however, which is the one with the fastest connection, using MSIE 6.0, doesn't show the majority of tabs at the top of the page. In particular it doesn't show the very convenient EN tab, which did show with the old Monobook skin (and does show in the computer with slow connection that runs Google Chrome). Jim.henderson (talk) 20:38, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

Can a bot add licence to my photos?

I updated my Commonist and it looked like it imported some settings - but apparently it didn't import my license, so the last few dozen photos I uploaded (from here up) have no license. Is there a bot that can add a free license {{self2|GFDL|cc-by-sa-3.0, 2.5,2.0,1.0}} to them, or do I have to do it manually? --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 19:00, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

I added the licenses with AWB, but noticed halfway through that I don't know what the license is was also there. Should that bit be removed? –Juliancolton | Talk 19:18, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
Yes, please - it seems to be the commonist default. I guess I need to look into ABW to be able to do this myself in the future... thanks. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 19:22, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
Replaced with See below. Indeed, AWB is quite useful, although there are no special features for this; I just used a find-and-replace run. Cheers. –Juliancolton | Talk 19:29, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

Policy on 3rd Party Notifications of Infringement?

Over on the Open Clip Art Library mailing list, there's currently a debate regarding a question that came into the helpdesk where someone said they believed that images submitted by a specific user came from a copyrighted source. The user has been contacted and reiterated their claim that the images are Public Domain, but there's still some apprehension.

The debate centers around what exactly needs to be done to maintain DMCA safe harbor protections? Do the images need to be removed immediately, pending investigation? Should they be left up, pending investigation (and if so, how long can the investigation take and how in-depth does it have to be)? Is the onus on the copyright holder to discover this themselves and file a DMCA notice? Or does a third party notification of infringement require a certain level of proof before it must be acted upon?

The librarians don't want to spend all their time on wild goose chases trying to track down vague allegations of infringement or take down the images from valued contributors prematurely. At the same time, no one wants to distribute copyrighted, non-PD works.

Does Wikimedia have an internal policy that lays out a detailed process for handling third party reports of infringing materials?

Thanks for any help on this,
Greg — Preceding unsigned comment added by 131.107.0.73 (talk • contribs)

Hi Greg. We generally just get deletion requests if there's some worry about copyright violations. In extreme cases I suppose it may get reported to a wikimedia staffer, not entirely sure, better wait for a crat to reply. -mattbuck (Talk) 20:22, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
I'm in a position to respond to this in light of my disputes with the NPG. The copyright holder sends a complaint to the service provider, who then takes it down. The person who uploaded it then has the opportunity to ask the images to be reinstated. At this point the service provider is no longer liable and the uploader assumes liability and is exposed to legal action. Thereafter, the images only need to be removed if the service provider receives a legal injunction to do so, which they may very well if legal action proceeds. There are a lot of materials on OCILLA online, but I also recommend consulting an attorney (this is not legal advice, etc.). Dcoetzee (talk) 20:42, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
(ec)If someone posts or e-mails OTRS about an image, and has a link of the copyvio file (and there is good evidence that it isn't a mirror, but instead predates the upload), I'll delete the image, regardless if the information came from a 3rd party or not. But it seems the OP is asking about cases where there isn't a clear original image linked to. I think without clear evidence such as that, I wouldn't delete an image based on vague 3rd party information from someone who thinks it may be a violation. I may try to look into it, or encourage the 3rd party to track down the source for verification. This is just my personal take on the situation. I cannot discuss the legal aspects (and nor can we give out legal advice here). Hope this gives you some ideas. -Andrew c (talk) 20:46, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
We also use {{Speedy delete}} and in case of clear copyright violations admins will occasionally delete on the spot without any wait. This last option is rarely used due to potential for abuse. --Jarekt (talk) 20:52, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
The normal process (I don't know much about policies) is that if someone thinks a file here is a copyright violation he nominates it for DR. Alternatively if he owns the copyright himself, he might send an email to info-en-c@wikimedia.org or an OCILLA request to the WMF. Stifle (talk) 08:40, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

April 14

photo from news release as Usage Restrictions: None

The news release from the National Oceanic Center includes a photo indicated as "Usage Restrictions: None", "Credit: NOC", see here. Need advise : is it suitable as public domain?--Bramfab (talk) 07:42, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

It should be OK, but may be you could try the e-mail given on the page. --GaAs11671 10:41, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
If you get any response indicating the image is PD, forward it to OTRS with a link to the image uploaded on Commons. Cheers.--Chaser (talk) 14:45, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

Explicit Images and Child Protection and Obscenity Enforcement Act

I'm very concerned about the presence of explicit images in Commons and Wikipedia. Explicit images, as defined by 18 U.S.C. § 2251 must be accompanied by a statement giving an address where information like the subjects real names and dates of birth are held. Wikimedia is a U.S. based organization and is not exempt from this.

For example, File:Anal intercourse.jpg shows a real-life close-up of anal penetration. The faces of the subjects are not shown, and no details are given about the possible identies, ages, or circumstances of the subjects portrayed. It's quite possible that this is actually a photo of the rape of an unconscious 16 year old female, there's no way to know.

I'm proposing that all explicit photos be removed in accordance with U.S. federal law. - Stillwaterising (talk) 13:04, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

I swear I've seen this type of discussions in the passed and the final out come was COM:NOTCENSORED, I'm also sure that Wikimedia would have looked into that law you have quoted and if all explicit photos on Wikimedia Commons breached the U.S. federal law, then we would have had a policy in place. Bidgee (talk) 13:13, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
Here's the penal code referenced above. The exception may come from the fact that Wikimedia is not a primary producer of images rather a secondary repository it would only need to comply with the law if the images are used for commercial purposes. However, the possesion of child pornography by anybody (except law enforcement I presume) is illegal. Since the primary producers are users, who are not exempted, and Wikimedia has no way of knowing which images are child pornography and which are not, it would seem to be a risky situation. However, many Porn 2.0 do accept user content, there must be some kind of statement signed by submitters that state that users assume liability for uploaded content [21] perhaps the same applies here. My hope is that the legal team has already looked into this.
I found a prior discussion here and an earlier discussion about the same contributor. The result was apparently keep for that photographer. The apparent policy seems to be for removal of images by means of DR on a case by case basis. - Stillwaterising (talk) 14:25, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
TinEye just told me, that your example image was a copyright violation. --Martin H. (talk) 15:23, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
Hello is it ; Category:Pedophilia ? Bye bye FrankyLeRoutier (talk) 16:09, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
I am bored with this subject. Sangers thinks we should censor Commons. I don't. --GaAs11671 17:33, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
My example got deleted so I found another one: File:Anal+Vaginal Fingering.jpg. The filename doesn't leave much to the imagination, so if this kind of stuff bothers you don't look at it. What the photo portrays is a young female with her rear toward the camera and face not visible. She looks to be between 16-19 years old but it's difficult to tell. I'm against censorship, but there's other policies to consider as well. From Commons:Project scope there is "Commons is not your personal free web host" and "Commons is not an amateur porn site". There is also W:WP:NOTSTUPID which says In general, "that is a terrible idea" is always sufficient grounds to avoid doing something, provided there is a good reason that the idea is terrible.
I'm not against pornography, as long as it's between consenting adults. I'm a member of WikiProject Pornography and WikiProject Sexology and Sexuality and contributed to several articles in these topics. - Stillwaterising (talk) 22:05, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
Her Flickr profile says she turned 20 this year, so that may not be the best example. But in general, I would agree with you. I am of the opinion that there's lots of sketchy files on Commons. As of right now we can only deal with them on a case by case basis. I think the community is getting hit kinda hard on all sides with allegations of poor/mismanagement of sexual materials. Killiondude (talk) 22:11, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
Brittsuza's photo brings up the issue of reliable sources and verifiability. She claims the photo is a self-portrait taken last year but how do we know if this true or not? She claims she just turned 20, but for all we know she could have actually just turned 18. User provided content such as Facebook or Flickr profiles are not considered reliable sources on Wikipedia so why should they be accepted here? If you want to see another unacceptable image click here (fellatio).
There's a solution to this that does not involve censorship. Procedures are in place to prevent copyright infringement, so why shouldn't the same measures be used to prevent images of minors? This makes no sense and unquestionable a bad idea.
Proposal: require all sexually explicit photos (nude or otherwise) be accompanied by a 18 U.S.C. 2257 (Federal Labeling and Record-Keeping Law) notification. Self-published images must be posted to a website that maintains these records. For privacy reasons Wikimedia should not accept copies of state ID cards for verification, since this would also require the release of personal information if requested for verification. All sexually explicit photos lacking 18 U.S.C. 2257 notification should be speedily deleted.
This isn't censorship because user submissions will still be allowed with proper verification. Child pornography is offensive and could lead to legal consequences for Wikimedia Foundation. Nobody is claiming that our copyright policy is censorship, why should they object to age verification? - Stillwaterising (talk) 01:25, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
The points you make are sound: playing fast and loose is not going to go down well if something should go to court; a policy that requires authenticated verification either at the source site or here would be a fair defense, I'd say. We can't stop people playing us for patsies but we can at least try to be responsible. It's not like the intertubes are short of porn, after all. JzG (talk) 22:07, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

I'm not really interested in the details of this proposal, frankly Wikiporn kind of bores me, and if there's consensus to crack down, go for it, I guess. But we do need to note that a little care is needed, because many images of extreme poverty, warzones, or just certain cultures with fewer nudity taboos may have non-sexual nudity. I'm thinking of an image I recently saw - I think on featured pictures, of a naked child with matted hair, sitting in front of a ruined building after a disaster, crying. I think we can agree that, while such images may be exploitative in different ways (why was the photographer snapping pictures instead of trying to help a child in distress?) they are not pornographic, and should not be judged by those rules.

I shall now bow out of this discussion. Adam Cuerden (talk) 01:57, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

Given this, and other recent threads, I'm minded to remove the 'rejected' tag from Commons:Sexual_content - it seems to me that consensus is moving in the direction of these simple proposals - please do take a look, and offer your thoughts if you have a mo. best, Privatemusings (talk) 02:06, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
Thanks for the support. My proposal only applies explicit photographic images. Nude images without sexual suggestiveness should not be affected, nor should non-realistic illustrations. If further guidelines are developed to restrict nudity I will support those as well.
I took a look at Commons:Sexual_content and made some revisions and additions. - Stillwaterising (talk) 04:14, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
I think I am in general agreement with Stillwaterising's proposal. What needs to be established is which jurisdiction's law applies. Is it US law because the Commons' servers are located in Florida? If so, then our policies should ensure that all state and federal laws relating to explicit material are complied with, in the same way that we have policies to ensure that copyright holders' legal rights are respected. This is entirely separate from the issue of whether Commons ought to be a host for large quantities of images that some people might regard as pornographic. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 08:21, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
I very strongly object to he current sexual content proposals as they do nothing to define the vague and highly culturally (and even more specific that that in some cases) dependent terms the use like "nudity", "explicit", "sexual content", "erotic", "violent" and "disturbing". Per other threads on this page, and many others elsewhere, nobody has yet been able to produce any objective definition of any of these terms that is culturally neutral (I can't see a way around this without requiring proof of age, consent, etc for any photograph that depicts any human, alive or dead, or any part of human anatomy. We'd probably also need to get this for any non-photographic image that depicts any human, humanoid, or human-like shape in it so we don't fall foul of laws that regulate things like "pseudo-photographs", or cultures that do not approve of making images of people. Additionally, on every occasion where someone has received a professional legal opinion regarding whether we need to do any of this, the answer is "No". That those involved in OTRS permissions say that the current system would not scale to this level and so from a technical perspective most of the proposals are unworkable also seems to be being ignored. Come back when you have a proposal that is all of:
  • technically feasible
  • specific in it's intended outcomes
  • objective, culturally neutral and NPOV in it's definition of what is to be filtered/taged/censored/otherwise restricted
  • demonstrably going to achieve the intended outcomes
  • supported by a clear, factual reason why it needs to be done (if this is for legal reasons, they need to be actual legal reasons given by a legal professional, not speculation by laypeople)
  • detailed in what procedures will be used to enable/enforce the policy
When you have all that, then we can see if there is a consensus to implement it. From all the recent discussions, I can't see any consensus to do anything - about half (at most) people saying "we should do something about things that I think are sexual content and or contain nudity and/or are otherwise explicit", with nothing approaching an attempt to define what they mean by that. Thryduulf (talk) 10:00, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

← We need to distinguish two things: (1) what the law requires us to do concerning sexually explicit images; and (2) whether it is a good idea for the Commons to host large quantities of sexually explicit images that are otherwise legal. I propose that we do not discuss issue 2 here. As for issue 1, we need to determine:

  1. What the applicable law is. Is it merely US law (state and federal), or does the law of each jurisdiction in which the Commons is accessible have to be complied with as well?
  2. What, if anything, these laws require. The Wikimedia Foundation's legal counsel should comment on these first two points. How do we go about requesting for advice from him or her?
  3. If there are certain legal requirements that must be complied with for the Commons to legally host the material, what is the best way to do so.

— Cheers, JackLee –talk– 10:20, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

If content is illegal in someones jurisdiction, then we should be giving them the best guidance on how to manage the issue and if feasible options to control the files coming from Commons to the person. To be reader friendly, Commons also needs to develop practices that do not have people viewing sexually explicit or sexuality titillating content totally unexpectedly. For example, a link from Wikipedia to Commons from an article about a game played by children should not lead to an image of adults engaged in sexual activity while playing this game. It is completely reasonable for us to adopt practices and process to prevent that from happening. This can be addressed in variety of ways but the sensible labeling of images into categories is the easiest and best way until other approaches are developed.
It has been suggested (by Bastique) that Commons develop guidelines similar to those used by other large prominent organizations off and on the internet. Commons is behind the curve in establishing guidelines and processes since many other major providers of content based on user uploaded files have something in place that allows users to control the feeds that they receive. Adapting a three level system of Safe, Moderate, and Unrestricted allows for more flexibility and I suggest this approach if it is technically feasible. I suggest further study of the approaches used by other organizations and then following the best practices of these organizations as feasible. FloNight♥♥♥ 11:11, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
I appreciate the sentiment but, again, to keep this discussion manageable, I suggest that we do not deal with issue 2 here. Conflating or confusing the two issues gets us nowhere. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 11:14, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
Issue 2 (developing a system to allow for self filtering) may be the most practical way to allow for individuals to stay legal in their own jurisdiction. And what approach is used to address this issue can be used address the other, so on a practical level it does not make sense to me to separate the issues in terms of developing a plan to manage sexually explicit content. FloNight♥♥♥ 11:41, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
I'll say again. If you feel the need to "manage sexually explicit content", please start by coming up with a definition of "sexually explicit content" that is (1) objective (2) culturally independent and (ideally) (3) will not make the system pointless through large amounts of false positives or false negatives. Thryduulf (talk) 16:22, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
I'll say again: don't act like we're inventing something new. Content filtering has been around for over a decade. Flickr currently has a system set up where users can set if they'd like to be warned before viewing images that are explicit (I currently have that set on my account there) and Google has a content filter in it for people who'd like to opt-in. Killiondude (talk) 05:00, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
Do Google and Flickr try to be multilingual and multi-cultural? What criteria do they use? Even if their criteria are not objective or culturally independent, they must have criteria to determine what "explicit" is and I've not been able to find (after only 2 minutes admittedly) what those criteria actually are. We cannot implement the same or similar systems to them without knowing this very basic bit of information. Thryduulf (talk) 08:12, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

← I've sent an e-mail to the Foundation's legal counsel Mike Godwin inviting him to participate in this discussion. The e-mail reads:

Hello, Mike,
I'm an editor active at the English Wikipedia and the Wikimedia Commons. There is currently a discussion ongoing at the Commons (http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Village_pump#Explicit_Images_and_Child_Protection_and_Obscenity_Enforcement_Act) about what, if anything, needs to be done about sexually explicit images, including those involving minors. I think we would welcome your input as the Foundation's legal counsel as to the following:
  • What laws, if any, are applicable to sexually explicit content in the Commons? Must Commons content comply only with the laws of the State of Florida and/or US federal law, or with the laws of other jurisdictions around the world where Commons content can be accessed through the Internet?
  • If there are applicable laws, what do they require Commons editors to do?
I hope you can shed some light on the matter by participating in the discussion to help steer the discussion in the direction of some useful outcome. Thanks.

— Cheers, JackLee –talk– 05:08, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

  • As far jurisdiction, Wikimedia needs to follow city, county, state, and federal laws applicable to a multinational business operating out of St. Petersburg, Florida. Certain countries are more restrictive about internet pornography, and some others like Singapore try to block it (see w:Legal status of Internet pornography). Even on Village Pump it is very difficult to gain consensus due to the wide number of viewpoints, and a vocal but misguided proponents of Commons be used as a free porn server without age and consent verification on the basis of "educational value" (See thread about Stan Spanker below for the debate). - Stillwaterising (talk) 11:21, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
It is simply not our standing practice to document all persons in our sexual photographic images, nor do I think this is necessary - if images are reasonably believed to depict minors we'll delete them when such revelations come to light. Our only obligation is to follow US law (which I think is overly strict and excludes images of educational value, but that's a political matter). Many pornographic images are deleted under issues of scope, largely because we already have large numbers of high-quality pornographic images and don't need a bunch of crappy ones. And I am not "vocal but misguided." Dcoetzee (talk) 20:50, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

As a non US resident, I decided that perhaps i should look up the laws and read them a bit more thoroughly. For anyone wondering what "sexually explicit conduct" means, the act actually refers to another act 18 U.S.C. 2256(2)(A). 

(A) Except as provided in subparagraph (B), “sexually explicit conduct” means actual or simulated—
(i) sexual intercourse, including genital-genital, oral-genital, anal-genital, or oral-anal, whether between persons of the same or opposite sex;
(ii) bestiality;
(iii) masturbation;
(iv) sadistic or masochistic abuse; or
(v) lascivious exhibition of the genitals or pubic area of any person;

Then there is this exception to the this definition in the case of images of child pornography when "digital image, computer image, or computer-generated image that is, or is indistinguishable from, that of a minor engaging in sexually explicit conduct;" 

(B) For purposes of subsection 8(B) [1] of this section, “sexually explicit conduct” means— 
(i) graphic sexual intercourse, including genital-genital, oral-genital, anal-genital, or oral-anal, whether between persons of the same or opposite sex, or lascivious simulated sexual intercourse where the genitals, breast, or pubic area of any person is exhibited;
(ii) graphic or lascivious simulated;
(I) bestiality;
(II) masturbation; or
(III) sadistic or masochistic abuse; or
(iii) graphic or simulated lascivious exhibition of the genitals or pubic area of any person;

TheDJ (talk) 23:18, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

I also note that the recordkeeping act 75.2a notes that "Records are not required to be maintained by either a primary producer or by a secondary producer for a visual depiction of sexually explicit conduct that consists only of lascivious exhibition of the genitals or pubic area of a person, and contains no other sexually explicit conduct, whose original production date was prior to March 18, 2009." Works before 1995 have no requirements at all. TheDJ (talk) 23:25, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

Requirements for secondary producers (it we are producers at all, we would be secondary): 

A producer who is a secondary producer as defined in §75.1(c) may satisfy the requirements of this part to create and maintain records by accepting from the primary producer, as defined in §75.1(c), copies of the records described in paragraph (a) of this section. Such a secondary producer shall also keep records of the name and address of the primary producer from whom he received copies of the records. The copies of the records may be redacted to eliminate non-essential information, including addresses, phone numbers, social security numbers, and other information not necessary to confirm the name and age of the performer. However, the identification number of the picture identification card presented to confirm the name and age may not be redacted.

TheDJ (talk) 23:33, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

This part is also fun. From 75.8
A computer site or service or Web address containing a digitally- or computer-manipulated image, digital image, or picture shall contain the required statement on every page of a Web site on which a visual depiction of an actual human being engaged in actual or simulated sexually explicit conduct appears. Such computer site or service or Web address may choose to display the required statement in a separate window that opens upon the viewer's clicking or mousing-over a hypertext link that states, “18 U.S.C. 2257 [and/or 2257A, as appropriate] Record-Keeping Requirements Compliance Statement.”
Ergo, if we decide to keep records, than each page display the image would require such a line. Technically not possible atm, and highly undesirable as an encyclopedia of course. TheDJ (talk) 23:38, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
I was unable to find an expiration date for record keeping. That means such records would have to be permanent throughout eternity. TheDJ (talk) 23:43, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
This through eternity part also made me realize that this creates a huge problem with freely licensed images, because they cannot be reused in most ways, without yourself becoming a secondary provider and having access to the records in question, which would surely violate WMF privacy policies. TheDJ (talk) 23:54, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

← Here's the response I got from Mike Godwin, legal counsel for the Wikimedia Foundation:

Larry Sanger's public comments are not grounded in a correct understanding of the relevant law, and his comments should not be taken as having any informational or probative value with regard to the question of legal risk. The Wikimedia Foundation would be informed by law enforcement, who know how to contact us when necessary, if particular images were illegal, but so far there has been no such communication. I am not currently aware of any content on any Wikimedia project that violates the relevant child-pornography statutes. Furthermore, obscenity law varies from community to community, but we haven't been contacted by law enforcement with regard to purportedly obscene images, either. It is well-established that "child pornography" is a legal category that does not mean the same thing as the legal category "obscenity." In the United States (the relevant legal jurisdiction for the Wikimedia Foundation), "child pornography" is, generally speaking, visual content generated by the use/abuse of a child as a sexual object. Although I by no means approve of all images uploaded to Commons or elsewhere, I am not aware of any imminent legal hazard facing the Foundation or any editors or contributors regarding uploaded sexual images.

I gather from this statement two things: (1) the relevant law that we need to concern ourselves with is US law, and not the law of any other country; but (2) although Mike doesn't say so expressly, he doesn't feel that any Wikipedia project, including the Commons, needs to have special procedures in place to guard against sexually explicit material that may violate obscenity or child pornography laws. If that is the case, then I don't have anything more to say about issue 1 that I identified in my earlier posting (whether the Commons needs to put in place procedures to ensure that sexually explicit material complies with applicable laws). Of course issue 2 (whether the Commons should develop policies concerning when sexually explicit material that is legal should be uploaded) is still outstanding. There are currently a couple of other threads on this talk page discussing this issue. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 07:24, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

Removal of images from Stan Spanker

Stan Spanker seems to be using Commons as his personal porn server. All images are marked as self-made with very brief descriptions. His contributions, all made in the last four months, are entirely pornographic consisting of mostly of w:BDSM.

Some of them seem to portray non consensual sex with minors. File:Las Vegas7.JPG shows a young woman performing fellatio blindfolded. The description reads "Girl has to do blowjob."

File:Afterspanking dagmar.jpg shows a woman with large red marks on her buttocks with the description "Dagmar: crying and sobbing after a sound spanking"

There's about 30 more, some I looked at, others I was afraid to. - Stillwaterising (talk) 03:20, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

I don't see Las Vegas7.JPG as portraying anything but an adult playing BDSM games. The description is, of course, inappropriate. Pictures of spanking are very important, though we hardly need all of them, because spanking (mostly of children) is a very historical practice whose results should be illustrated in an uncensored encyclopedia, even if we feel it inappropriate to use pictures of children to do so.--Prosfilaes (talk) 16:16, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
To expand on that; as an uncensored set of educational materials, that includes material on modern kinky sex, including the modern chastity guard and what-not. Unfortunately, the fact that a lot of people want to include these pictures for non-educational reasons, and a lot of people want to remove these pictures for non-educational reasons tend to make them a mess. Las Vegas7.JPG should probably be deleted as being redundant and lacking important information.--Prosfilaes (talk) 16:33, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
Exaggerated claims of "educational value" have no basis in reality. Project Scope guideline say that images "must be realistically useful for an educational purpose". Please tell me what WikiProject these images could be used in? WikiProject Pornography does not allow nudity. WikiProject Sexology and sexuality uses illustrations for sexual acts, not photographs.
They are also not suitable for commercial use because they don't have 18 U.S.C. § 2251 information. In case you don't know what that is, it's detailed records including the photographers name, the dates of session, consent form from the models, and birth certificates. Unless you fax me all that information then you have no proof that these images are NOT non-consensual child pornography. And according to the COPINE Scale these images would be a 9-10 out of 10, which carries the highest criminal penalties. Also "an otherwise non-educational file does not acquire educational purpose solely because it is in use on a gallery page or in a category on Commons." - Stillwaterising (talk) 02:55, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
We do not presume that images depict child pornography because we don't have proof they don't (we delete images where there's reason to believe they might be, or there are other compelling reasons to delete). Additionally, you should not take En's restrictive image policies for sexual topics as representative of all Wikipedias, or as a standard that shall endure forever; I for one have long been pushing for more liberal use of explicit images in English Wikipedia articles. Dcoetzee (talk) 05:24, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
We do not presume ... - well, when it is about copyright violation, we do exactly follow that logic and, IMHO, we do rightily so. Shall we now take a potential violation of a human being less serious than a potential violation of a material or virtual ownership? --Túrelio (talk) 15:41, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
Not really - how many images do we have a signed license statement from the copyright holder for? (the answer is zero - not even OTRS goes to this level of verification) If we had to conduct careful documentation of every image, we'd never get anything done. The precautionary principle advises deleting images where a reason to doubt their copyright status has arisen, not where there's no solid proof of their free status. Dcoetzee (talk) 21:03, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
The "reason to believe they might be" is as follows: the description says "girl has to do blowjob" which suggests that this is a non-consensual act. Live images of rape or simulated rape are banned by US Federal law. Furthermore, any photographer of explicit images must gather and preserve 18 U.S.C. § 2251 information regardless on how the pictures are intended to be used. The small size of the girl's breast suggest that she may be anywhere from 16-20 years old and the Description explicitly states that she "has to" perform fellatio for unstated reasons. With such information in place, the burden of proof is with the submitter or his supporters to prove beyond a reasonable doubt the legitimacy of these photos.
Furthermore, there are other compelling reasons to delete. My (short) list of arguments all quoted from official Wikimedia policy:
  1. "The fact that an unused pornographic image could theoretically be used to illustrate an article on pornography does not mean that we should keep all pornographic images"
  2. "Commons is not an amateur porn site: Although Commons is not censored, we may still remove low-quality pornographic images that do not contribute anything educationally useful to our existing collection of images. As a result, uploaded low-quality photographs of genitalia are generally deleted quickly." (For the policy, see COM:PS#Censorship and COM:PS#Must be realistically useful for an educational purpose).
  3. "Commons is not your personal free web host: Although we do host media and images on Commons, all content must be within our project's scope, which requires, among other things, that all media must be realistically useful for an educational purpose. Unless your images are educationally useful and in the scope of this project, Commons is not a place to store your vacation photo collection."
  4. "The statement "Commons is not censored" is not a valid argument for keeping a file that falls outside Commons' defined scope."
  5. It' also a legal nightmare if these images do up being child porn or rape. See w:wp:BADIDEA which says "In general, "that is a terrible idea" is always sufficient grounds to avoid doing something, provided there is a good reason that the idea is terrible."

- Stillwaterising (talk) 11:10, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

I'm not arguing in favor of keeping these particular images - to be sure they're of limited use, have poor descriptions, and we have plenty of existing images of these sex acts of higher quality. I'm arguing against your suggestion that we should delete any image depicting sexual acts without accompanying documentation, which is not standing practice and in my opinion more than a little paranoid. I'm also arguing against your assertion that explicit photos have no educational value, period. Dcoetzee (talk) 20:25, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
No one has argued either of those points. These images can and should be handled on a case-by-case basis. Please stop with the censorship paranoia. Kaldari (talk) 21:57, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
Stillwaterising was arguing these points above, and I was responding to him. I'm trying to participate in the larger policy discussion around this issue, I consider the issue with the images resolved. Dcoetzee (talk) 00:06, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
I think we need to err on the side of caution, as I've argued before. If an image might be of a minor, and/or might be taken without consent, we need a proof of age, and/or model release on file or the image is, and ought to be, subject to deletion. We can't keep something because we "think it's OK", we have to have reasonable assurance it is. ++Lar: t/c 02:23, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
THese images can be easily abused and used for pornography. Plus, I've changed the rule and remove the "amateur" so that it now reads no pornography. With the way its phrased, it seems that "professional" pornography is allowed. --Tyw7  (☎ Contact me! • Contributions)   Changing the world one edit at a time! 21:46, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
Erm, which rule have you changed and did you have consensus for eeh change? Pornography has always been within the scope of commons (given that it is a subject about which encyclopaedic articles can be written for example). As long as files are within scope, appropriately licensed and not duplicated by higher quality images, I am not aware that whether an image was created by professionals or amateurs has ever mattered one bit. Also, every image can be abused, so that is an irrelevant argument regarding any action about any image. Thryduulf (talk) 23:31, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

special:random/file is not random at all

Clicking on this link, I was redirected three times this week to File:PDB 2q6j EBI.png. Considering Commons has more than 6M files, clicking on special:random/file should never lead twice to the same image, and trice should be so improbable that no one should have a reason to write a message on COM:VP --GaAs11671 20:00, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

Intriguing. I just clicked it 4 times and got 4 different images, but one was a map of Florida, so for that may you die slowly. It does seem a bit odd to be redirected to it 3 times though. -mattbuck (Talk) 20:19, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
Do you know the en:Birthday problem? Getting the same twice is actually not thaaat improbable - increases rapidly, the more times you hit random page - even with six million files. Have not calculated how many times you would have to hit it to get a 50% chance of getting the same image twice, but I think you would be surprised how relative few times that is. Getting the same file trice is indeed quite improbable, but not impossible. Just like winning in the lottery, some do you know? That said, there could be something else at play. Say if the random generator is reset with the same seed every time the server is started you will get the same sequence after a restart and the images being first in queue will be much more probably to get, thus making such incidents more likely. I do not have the needed insight into the mediawiki framework to answer it in a qualified manner. It would be useful to know though, approximately how many times you think you have hit that random page button over the course of time, where you have hit the same image trice. --Slaunger (talk) 20:21, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
Just made a quick calculation concerning twice observations, which you say should "never lead twice to the same image". If the random generator used to select an image is perfect, and the sequence is new and random whenever the server is restarted, there will be 1% chance of having hit two identical files after 360 clicks. Clicking more times rapidly increases the probablity: 1924 random pages (25%), 2989 random pages (50%), 5442 random pages (90%), 10881 pages (99.99%)! Please note that 10,881 is much much less than the 6.429 million files assumed to be in the pool. Let me get back to you on the probability of getting the same page three times. --Slaunger (talk) 20:49, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
Just brute forced 100 numerical simulations of "Click random file until three identical images occur assuming random generator is perfect". The results span from 9,000-107,000 random files with an average of about 53,000 random files. This seems to indicate that one or more of these statements are correct
  • you were somewhat "unlucky"/"lucky" (depending on how you see this)
  • the random generator is not thaat random
  • that you actually hit random file of the order 10,000 times or more in a week
  • that the random generator it is seeded with the same number at each restart and that the server has had two or three restarts during the course of that week.
--Slaunger (talk) 21:19, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
Are you sure you were not browsing offline? Anyway try to empty your browser cache--Pierpao.lo (listening) 20:26, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
Sqrt(n), so you'd have to click the button on the order of a few thousand times before you have a good chance of seeing the same image twice. Dcoetzee (talk) 20:44, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
I'm sure. --GaAs11671 20:45, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
It's well known that Special:Random does not, in fact, actually give a completely uniform distribution of pages. Rather, the way it actually works is that each page is assigned a random number (uniform between 0 and 1) which is stored in the database. When you request a random page, MediaWiki picks a new random number and returns the first (eligible) page whose number is greater than it.
What this leads to is that, in effect, the pages are picked with respective probabilities that are themselves approximately Beta-distributed with parameters (α=1, β=n-1), where n is the total number of pages eligible to be picked. (Specifically, it's the first order statistic of n-1 independent random variables uniformly distributed between 0 and 1.)
Anyway, the upshot of all this maths is that the probability of getting the same page twice in a row from Special:Random is somewhat higher than what it would be if it was completely uniform, which probability, as explained above, is itself higher than what one might intuitively expect due to the birthday paradox. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 21:27, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
Aha, interesting. If it was not so late, I would adjust the result above, where I assumed it was a uniform random distribution to the beta distribution.--Slaunger (talk) 21:33, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
Yeah, once I saw this title I was going to respond with the fact that Special:Random isn't quite that random, but it's not documented very well just how "unrandom" it can be. Perhaps we should put that in the FAQ and/or put it on some mediawikiwiki page. Killiondude (talk) 22:32, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
Also, it's worth noting that sometimes unlikely things just happen. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 21:39, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
@Ilmari Karonen: very interresting, if there is a big "hole" in the numbers assigned to the pages, the first page after the "hole" has a much higher probability to be selected. And yes, sometimes unlikely things just happen .
Concerning the en:Birthday problem, I will try to make the calculation for 3 times in 6M pages.
--GaAs11671 12:24, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
I made a small program to test that with a normal distribution: for 1 million files, you would need to click around 17 thousands times on "random file" to have a 50% chance seeing 3 times the same file (3500 for 100000 files). I don't think I clicked "random" that much in a week Clin. Assuming I clicked 500 times, for 6M files the probability to see 3 times the same file is less than 0.05%. --GaAs11671 15:45, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
I just made 10,000 brute force simulations using the statistics scheme outlined by Ilmari with 6.43 M files. The lowest number of random files I got to get the same file trice was 1,627, the average was 31,089 as the max was 71,591. Getting the same file only twice is much more likely. For 10,000 samples I actually got as low as 10 random files to get a duplicate, average 2,255 and max 8,670. Notice that the non-uniform distribution lowers the 50% number from 2,989 (uniform) to 2,255 (beta) - a significant, but not crazy reduction in randomness. --Slaunger (talk) 18:37, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
Following that interesting insight from Ilmari (interesting because I use RandomFile relatively often) and the initially mentioned expirience would mean a higher visitor number at File:PDB 2q6j EBI.png. Thats not confirmed. So I think its much more likely, that GaAs got different imags from the e.g. Category:Structural Classification of Proteins (SCOP) including ~47500 files with 'PDB code EBI.png' filenames (number based on MostLinkedTemplates, I not checked them ;)). --Martin H. (talk) 16:57, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
Ahm, it is not certain that the file is much more likely to hit than others, but it is likely. Yes, statistics can be counterintuitive... But getting that particular file much more often than 1 in a million is unlikely. Regarding the page hit stats I do not think it is updated yet for the day reported by the OP. At least for other files I checked, which normally has many hits per day, there were no data after April 9, 2010. --Slaunger (talk) 20:00, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
Looking at the numbers above, my conclusion is that it's not so improbable, the only thing improbable is that it happened to me . Special:random/file is clicked around 5000 times per day [22], so the probability that one user amongst all the users see 3 times the same file each week is not negligible. --GaAs11671 22:20, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
Well, this may also be a glitch in the Matrix. What pill did you take this morning ? Blue pills like me have no problem seing a different image each time. — Xavier, 22:34, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

Other random function?

By the way, I've often thought it would be nice if there were a special URL which would return thumbnails of 48 random images (similar to Special:NewFiles , which returns thumbnails of the 48 most recently uploaded images). I'm certain I would use it a lot more than I currently do the Special:Random/File function (which returns only one image page, with the image displayed at a large size). AnonMoos (talk) 16:31, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

This would probably be doable with JavaScript and the list=random API query. Or a toolserver page. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 17:03, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
Very good idea. --GaAs11671 22:00, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

Scope or not scope ?

thats the question for these images: http://toolserver.org/~daniel/WikiSense/Gallery.php?wikifam=commons.wikimedia.org&img_user_text=Tkommer - user Tkommer uploaded files about an expedition to the south pole, people from Germany, who take a tour in antartica. All unused (as far as I see). In scope, or not ? (I did not check for Wikipedia-articles and deletions.) Cholo Aleman (talk) 04:38, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

PS: seems to be taken from there own website, all are small Cholo Aleman (talk) 04:40, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
It think they were probably meant to illustrate de:Aloha Antarctica, which has been deleted. I suppose you could nominate them for deletion as lacking educational use. Then again, it's a total of six files — I wouldn't really worry about it too much. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 16:59, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
If there were images of the tour, it would be more interesting. For now, it seems that they are just missing an OTRS tag. -- User:Docu at 09:52, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

Creator template crowding birth year and death year categories

Hello,

I don't see the point in this diff (1 October 2009) which adds every creator template into a birth year and a death year category. It is enough to have the creator template inserted into ":Category:<Name> <Surname>", which is itself a subcateogry of the birth year and a death year categories.

This violates COM:OVERCAT (Don't place an item into a category and its parent) and I wish this diff to be reverted. Teofilo (talk) 09:27, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

 Question What gives you the impression that this "crowds" the birth/death year categories? -- User:Docu at 10:00, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
The purpose of main space categories is to help file-seeking users find files, not creator templates! Creator templates should be moved to the template category space. If one sole creator template is located in ":Category:<Name> <Surname>", I can close my eyes, because it is only one. But when I see thousands of such templates in the birth or death year categories, I have the feeling that we are forgetting the purpose of Commons (bring files, not templates, to people). Teofilo (talk) 12:31, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
You can append "#mw-category-media" to the category url and you will see only files. That said, personally, I'm not convinced if it's a good idea to place files directly into birth year/death year categories. -- User:Docu at 12:37, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
"Category:<Name> <Surname>" shouldn't be a subcategory of "Category:<Birthyear> births" or "Category:<Deathyear> deaths". That's the first thing to fix.
What remains after fixing the wrong categorisation of "Category:<Name> <Surname>" is the question whether we want to put the birth and death categories in the creator template "Creator:<Name> <Surname>" or in the gallery page "<Name> <Surname>". I'd opt for categorising the galleries and not categorising the creator templates. That's the only way that is meaningful and sound without redundancy. --Slomox (talk) 10:56, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
Um, if we DON't categorise the creator cats by birth year and death year there's almost no point in having the birth year and death year cats. Almost all creators lack gallery pages. Adam Cuerden (talk) 11:32, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
I'll take an example because I find the discussion hard to read otherwise. I think it's quite obvious that Creator:Claude Monet and the gallery Claude Monet need to go in Category:Claude Monet: that's the easiest way to link these 3 pages, and I think it is always done this way. The logical conclusion is that it is Category:Claude Monet which should be sorted into Category:1840 births, not the creator template nor the gallery, to avoid over-categorization. Pruneautalk 11:59, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
Unless you place the creator template into Category:1840 births, you can't really select all creator templates of persons born that year. -- User:Docu at 12:13, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
Sure you can, for example with CatScan. Is selecting all creator templates of people born in a specific year something that is done very often? Pruneautalk 13:52, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
Indeed. One might as well argue that they also ought to be placed in Category:19th-century births to facilitate finding all creator templates of persons born in that century... and so on. I really don't know why it is that people keep thinking they've found the one unique exception to COM:OVERCAT when it's really always the same hypothetical search for generics. —LX (talk, contribs) 06:03, 15 April 2010 (UTC)
You should try a sample where the structure isn't as clean as for Monet. As it was removed since, we can't really do that. -- User:Docu at 09:35, 15 April 2010 (UTC)
Creator Category Schema

I did the original edit criticized by Teofilo. The idea was that since a great many categories ":Category:<Name> <Surname>" are not in birth/death year categories than at least ":Creator:<Name> <Surname>" would be categorized. This addition of creator pages was criticized before (see here or here) and as I mentioned before here, I would like to remove those categories from creator pages after ensuring that ":Category:<Name> <Surname>" have them. --Jarekt (talk) 13:21, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

I did another edit and moved automatically generated birth/death year categories from creator pages to creator categories. Most creator categories transcludes corresponding creator templates (example first line of Category:Claude Monet is {{creator:Claude Monet}}). If creator template finds itself in a category with name matching its creator template name than the birth/death year categories are added. In many cases, like Category:Claude Monet, birth/death year categories will be also explicitly added, but in many cases they are not. This change fits well with Creator Category Schema. I think it might make sense to write a bot to ensure that all birth/death year categories are explicitly added to creator categories and than retire this auto categorizing code altogether. --Jarekt (talk) 13:46, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

North Dakota School for the Deaf

Hi there, Add to this photos put in File:North Dakota School for the Deaf.bmp North Dakota School for the Deaf. Thank Rossdegenstein (talk) 00:39, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

Hello, I'm sorry, but I don't understand what you are wanting to do. The image you linked to does not exist, nor is there a category for that school. Please rephrase, or try again in your native language if it is not English. — Huntster (t @ c) 01:06, 15 April 2010 (UTC)
May be he is speaking of one of the deleted image of this user on en: (see his talk page). --GaAs11671 07:02, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

What PD tag on File:Arthur Rimbaud. Aden ca1885.png?

I put both {{PD-old}} and {{PD-Yemen}} on this file (taken in Aden, Yemen, around 1890) but in fact I don't know what to do.

  • {{PD-old}} says "life of the author plus 70 years" but the author is unknown (and is probably unknow for ever) and it's a bit short to assume he is dead before 1940.
  • {{PD-Yemen}} is very confortable as it says "This image was created in Yemen and is now in the public domain because (...) It is a photographic work produced more than ten years ago", but Yemen didn't exist before 1918.
  • In 1890, Aden was under british rule, so does {{PD-UK-unknown}} apply? It says "This UK artistic work, of which the author is unknown (...) is in the public domain because (...) A photograph, which was made available to the public before 1 January 1940" but it's clearly not the case (made public in 2010).

So... your opinion is needed. --GaAs11671 17:45, 15 April 2010 (UTC) PS: I really would like PD-Yemen applies.

I put a message on COM:BI#La photo de Rimbaud est-elle du domaine public ? as it is mainly a concern for French-speaking people. --GaAs11671 18:08, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

Bundesarchiv categorization

When will this matter be resolved? http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Village_pump/Archive/2010Jan#Bundesarchiv_categorization Last comment was: "I don't understand. An incredibly useful archives of photographs is now going to sit in the database in a state of near uselessness because someone thinks that assigning it into useful categories is "vandalism"? Is that what I just read? I mean, despite a consensus of editors/users who agreed that the by year templates would be a very handy thing to have indeed?" But no answer was given.68.144.162.78 00:17, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

An overhasty start was already made, see e.g. Category:Images from the German Federal Archive from 1906. Overhasty becaue for 99% of the images in that example category the date is simply wrong. Your help is appreciated to correct the date according to the archive description (most cases: between 1906 and 1918) and move the image to an appropriate content category such as Category:1906 to replace the temporary categorization permanently. You can also go to Category:Images from the German Federal Archive and search for subjects or years in the special search form there and add appropriate content categories. Go and make yourself usefull, thats an extremly time intensive work. We already made great advances in Category:Cities in Germany by decade, enjoy it. --Martin H. (talk) 01:54, 30 January 2010 (UTC)
I believe the last thing I heard was Multichill offer to rebuild the structure he dismantled through some semi-automatic means. I am not sure what he means so I was waiting to see what he is planning to do. Otherwise if we have consensus we can easily either revert the changes to the template and recreate the structure, or run a bot for a few days and add the categories to all 82k images. The template approach is easier but I dislike autocategorization if there is other way. But either way is fine with me. Also Martin H., the discussion here is not about any "temporary" structure but about a permanent "by collection by year" structure some of us find more useful than categories like Category:1906. I am a little confused why 99% of images in Category:Images from the German Federal Archive from 1906 are wrong: they are from Bundesarchiv and they are all clearly marked as from 1906. If you think the date is incorrect may be you can correct it? My bot was not a mind-reader and was only sorting images into categories based by date specified in the information template. --Jarekt (talk) 04:49, 30 January 2010 (UTC)
The date derived from BArch was only the first year, the correct date was not transfered. It is a terrible mess and an boring work to remove all the categories again, to correct the date (which must be done by a bot who can read the original archival description - or in my case by hand because I have not the technical knowledge to create such a bot or script). In this case of the 1906 photos the photos are all from Walther Dobbertin, a photographer in German East Africa, sorting them into a category tree of German Colonialism as a periode of time is satisfying, for most images a better by date categorization is not possible or not yet known. Categorization includes categorization by Date or time periode (German colonialism, pre WWI), location if possible, subject like animals, special buildings, ethnic groups,... In fact the subject categorization is poor for this images but the by date categorization for this images was already done! The addition of a new by date category takes all efforts done so far for a ride or is some kind of job creation program. And again: Temporary categorization is a good idea to finally include the images to the date categories. The date categorization was "catalyzed" by the BArch images, it was something we not did before this upload so consequently. But a permanent source category tree is unwanted. This is Wikimedia Commons, we have our own category tree, this is not the Bundesarchiv database or a mirror of it. --Martin H. (talk) 16:01, 30 January 2010 (UTC)
Martin, I will be happy to help with some bot edits. If there is a need we could create some page coordinating those. However my AWB bot would not be able to access BArch database. --Jarekt (talk) 18:59, 30 January 2010 (UTC)
Personally I prefer autocategorized for categorizing collections (most collection category are template based). If Multichill finds another way, I'd be interested in seeing it implemented. That corrections are needed isn't really an argument against it.
IMHO, suggesting people use search instead or discourage them to work on categorizing images aren't arguments relevant to the discussion. -- User:Docu at 08:09, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

Dear IP could you explain why the BA-images are something special and should thus not be mixed with imgaes from other sources? Cheers --Cwbm (commons) (talk) 16:33, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

They are special because it's a collection of 100,000 photos! It's not easy to sort through 100,000 photos without some sort of internal categorization, especially since it is not possible on Commons to view intersections of categories. This dogmatic insistence that certain types of intersection categories are simply not allowed on Commons is ridiculous, and Multichill's insistance on enforcing this "regulation" is draconian and against consensus. I had the same issue with Wikipedia Loves Art. We needed internal categorization to sort the 5,000 photos into groups by museum. Even though everyone agreed this was necessary, at least until they could be hand-sorted into museum-specific categories like "Sculptures at the Metropolitan Museum of Art", Multichill insisted on deleting the categories so that no one could figure out which photos were related to which museums without going through 5,000 photos by hand. For extremely large collections of photographs, intersection categories should be allowed, at least until hand-sorting is completed. Kaldari (talk) 18:38, 30 January 2010 (UTC)
I would not call it a collection, but still, why do files have to be treated different if they come from a specific source? --Cwbm (commons) (talk) 07:36, 31 January 2010 (UTC)
@Cwbm - Nobody here insists on not "not mixing with images from other sources" that is still the key goal. The discussion is about categories allowing you to brouse a single collection of images often in order to organize it better. --Jarekt (talk) 18:53, 30 January 2010 (UTC)
But why then you want to mix the files don't you add regular year categories? --Cwbm (commons) (talk) 07:36, 31 January 2010 (UTC)
What is special about images from different sources is that they are all different. Templates are different, subject is different, time period is different, problems with descriptions are different. That is why it is easier to categorize them separately and this is why people like to browse them separatly --Jarekt (talk) 02:39, 1 February 2010 (UTC)
There are several other collections that can be browsed chronologically. I don't see why people go to such lengths to break this here. Besides that, the problem with the import Martin raised needs to be fixed eventually. -- User:Docu at 05:42, 1 February 2010 (UTC)
@Docu: Example or lie. @Jarekt: Apart from the tautology, files tagged with {{PD-USGov}} also form a collection according to the reasoning in this thread. Nobody has every asked to implement a category system by year for these files although there are at least as many of them. --Cwbm (commons) (talk) 06:52, 1 February 2010 (UTC)
 Comment Isn't it possible to do categorization work on a private wiki? Paradoctor (talk) 19:11, 30 January 2010 (UTC)
Since cat:s such as Category:19th-century European art in the Honolulu Academy of Arts seem uncontroversial, I don't see why some resist cat:ting Bundesarchiv images by date. In any case, I had understood that the principle had been generally accepted - the question was how best technically to achieve the categorisation. Man vyi (talk) 10:43, 31 January 2010 (UTC)


So lets talk about how to add Bundesarchiv images by date. As I already mentioned above I see only 2 ways, but there might be other approaches. Please add your comments next to each:

1) By template - just undo parts of this edit and we are done.

 Support although, I and other people do not like using autocategorization for non-maintenance categories, on the other hand this approach would be fast and easy to maintain. --Jarekt (talk) 15:14, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

2) By adding regular category to each image

 Support I (or someone else) would run a bot for a couple days and add the categories to all 82k images. I thought that what we agree to in one of the frequent discussions on the subject; however when I started adding categories I was blocked for "Vandalism" --Jarekt (talk) 15:14, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

3) Is there third way?

--Jarekt (talk) 15:14, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

I would prefer if you could answer my question. --Cwbm (commons) (talk) 15:59, 31 January 2010 (UTC)
Here is the solution I would like to see implemented:
  1. Revert Multichill's edit to the template so that all of the Bundesarchiv images are auto-assigned to categories like "Category:Images from the German Federal Archive, year 1943". Make all of these categories hidden. This way you can use the categories to find things within the collection, but it won't intrude on the "official" categorization.
  2. Run a bot to manually assign year categories to all the Bundesarchiv images, so that each image belongs to a category like "Category:1943".
This should satisfy both goals. Kaldari (talk) 01:01, 1 February 2010 (UTC)
That would be fine with me. It might not work for the 68.144.162.78 who might have to get an account to see hidden categories ;) --Jarekt (talk) 02:39, 1 February 2010 (UTC)
Since I hear no additional comments (for or against) I will go ahead and implement Kaldari solution. --Jarekt (talk) 12:50, 2 February 2010 (UTC)
So what is going on with this - where do we stand?139.48.25.60 15:45, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
Per above discussion the category structure was recreated. But soon after it was dismantled again since "There was no consensus at all on how to do this." --Jarekt (talk) 17:44, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
Jarekt, date is content, not collection specific. If you want to build smaller parts of the collection search for collection sepcific things like the here so called "batch" which represents the collection in the archive - e.g. the press agencies (Bild 183,), various photographers heritages (e.g. Bild 194 for Category:Hans Lachmann) and so on. The entire archive is not organzied by date but by collection. Furthermore it is not required to categorize this collections because Category:Images from the German Federal Archive is already sorted by collections from the filename. Dont create a redundant category tree of some content categorization we already have. Better help including the image to a Commons content category system. --Martin H. (talk) 14:56, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
Talk about your typical tight-assed German. Excuse me, but your comment "it is not required" has clearly been disproven by multiple users who clearly think that a "by date" category would be extremely useful. How many people need to indicate to you that the archive as it stand now is USELESS TO THEM because it means having to search through 10s of 1,000s of images instead of just flipping through a few hundred in the year that is pertinent to their research??? So to make things "easier" you competely break a functioning system and force users to go in and waste what will be thousands of hours categorizing photos for you so you can have a German sense or order? The problem is that even if that happened (never will by the way) YOU STILL CAN'T SEARCH because researchers use the photos for multitudes of reasons. If I want to find photos of an M1944 Wehrmacht field jacket, the only way I can do it is to search by date - none of the photo captions indicate what kind of clothes anyone is wearing, nor do I expect them to. Nor would I expect anyone to categorize them that way. But if it is done by date, it is relatively easy to flip through a few hundred photos from 1944-45 because I know that is the only time they were worn. So congratulations on making the collection completely useless for many, many users.68.144.172.8 14:23, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
This justifies the creation of a category for that jacket and the creation of a category tree 'Military of the Third Reich by time' such as Wehrmacht in 1945 and so on, a category system that in rudiment is already started. It not justifies to change our opinion on (temporary) source categories. If you not expect Commons to build and improve its category system maybe this is the wrong place for you. --Martin H. (talk) 14:54, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Dubious ownership details

Hiya there. I’ve been getting a little concerned about a few images being added to a gallery and I was hoping that someone with more experience on wikicommons might be able to look into it for me.

User:Medcroft has uploaded about 31 images to Mark 8 Landing Craft Tank, and has marked himself as the author and source of all of them (I think). However I’m starting to have my doubts. Aside from the fact that the images span a twenty-year period, several of them seem to have been taken directly from the web. From dealings with him on Wikipedia I’m aware that Medcroft actually served on two of these craft in the seventies, so I wouldn’t be surprised if most of the colour ones are his, but several others seem to have come from this website in particular.

File:L4061 (HMAV Audemer) 1.jpg, File:L4061 (HMAV Audemer) 2 - after modifications.jpg, File:L4128.jpg, File:L4073 (RASCV Ardennes).jpg, File:L4073 (RASCV Ardennes).jpg, are all on the various pages of the above site. They exactly match the image sizes (in pixels) of those images and look to me like exact copies. Most of them are also attributed to individuals. File L4128 had also previously been uploaded onto Wiki with the source details marked as unknown (it was therefore deleted)

File:L4074 2.jpg, File:L4074 2.jpg, File:L4164 1.jpg, File:L4164 2.jpg are also on the site, but are slightly smaller sizes on wikicommons. I suspect though that most of them have been cropped a little (on the above website they all have borders or are at angles). Given the similarity in the images (scratches, exposure etc…) I suspect they are just cropped versions.

File:HMS Counterguard (L4043).jpg is on this site where it appears with a copyright. I’m worried that on the commons version there appears to have been photoshopping in the top right corner (notice the horizontal line next to the black dot).

Medcroft and I have had what might be described as a ‘run-in’ on Wikipedia, mainly about the content of the article en:Mark 8 Landing Craft Tank. At the root of it there seems to be a genuine misunderstanding as to what Wiki is. Medcroft seems to think of the page as a personal webhost and was insistent about adding inappropriate, unsourced personal observations (see for example this edit or this warning to other users). Various users have tried to help and he seems to be getting better, but I’m worried that he might also misunderstand copyright and public domain matters on wikicommons as well. I’d be grateful if someone would be kind enough to have a look into this and give me a second opinion. I have asked Medcroft about the matter on his user page but haven’t received a reply (I’m not expecting one either I must admit).

Thanks in advance, Ranger Steve (talk) 18:12, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

If there's a more appropriate place to report this, can anyone direct me to it? Cheers, Ranger Steve (talk) 09:48, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
Seriously guys, any help? I'd hate to think what a regular memeber of the public would have to go through if they spotted a copyright infrngement and wanted to report it..... Ranger Steve (talk) 10:52, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
  • Curiously InternetArchive doesn't know the site landingcraft.webs.com [23]
  • For www.britains-smallwars.com the image was there in 2001 [24]
I would say: press the "nominate for deletion" button. --GaAs11671 14:38, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
Thanks GaAs, I suspected it was heading that way. Done: Commons:Deletion requests/Images of LCT8 Ranger Steve (talk) 18:16, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

How to get rid of the weird lay-out?

How do I get rid of the skin? It's not April 1, so I want to get the real lay-out displayed. Where do I have to click... and who on earth decided to set it as a default for logged-in users (let alone IPs, who don't even have a choice)?? Thanks, Ibn Battuta (talk) 22:45, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

Go to Special:Preferences and change your skin to MonoBook. Regards, -- ChrisiPK (Talk|Contribs) 22:50, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
(Thank|Blame) the usability team! Vector: Coming to a wikimedia wiki near you! :-) Killiondude (talk) 07:08, 15 April 2010 (UTC)
Thanks!!!! Yes, after posting I've realized that it seems to have something to do with the discussions about some vectors... :o) Well, at least here we don't have to wonder who had "too much money on their hands" to invest in new layouts! :o) --Ibn Battuta (talk) 01:50, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

April 15

Uploading new versions over existing files

I had no trouble uploading a new version over existing files. I didn't select the "Ignore any warnings". Jtico (talk) 06:05, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Do you ask for the bug to be restored? Clin--GaAs11671 15:27, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
Yes, this seems to be fixed now. I've removed the notice from MediaWiki:Sitenotice. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 18:21, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Telling newcomers to crowd general keyword categories

I thought there was a consensus with the idea that general keyword categories should remain meta-categories containing only more detailed subcategories (with some exceptions for a few files if necessary, if these files, for some reasons, are difficult to put elsewhere).

So I began the process of reviewing the category examples given to newcomers on Commons:Categories, and changed the examples so that newcomers are told to put files directly into the subcategories rather than crowd general keyword categories (diff 1).

But User:Docu reverted my changes concerning Category:helicopters (diff 2).

I am not going to waste my time any longer diffusing categories, like Category:ursus maritimus (polar bears) which was an alphabetically (which is hardly different from randomly) sorted mix of more than 200 (230-250?)(more than one category page) polar bears in zoos, in the wild, on stamps, on maps, if there is no community consensus.

I don't blame newcomers who do it. But this is not a reason for telling them that it is OK and that they should not improve their categorizing skills.

I also wish that the developers develop a tool to issue a popup warning (or any kind of warning) telling users who try to add one more file into a category tagged with {{Crowded}}. At present, my feeling is that such tagging is useless. Either a category is well sorted, distributed into neat subcategories, and users find their way into the subcategories. Or the category is a big mix of everything: you can tag it with {{Crowded}}, but nothing happens.

I also wish the Commons' categories to be visible from Wikipedia pages. The more visible they are, the more people will come to help.

Teofilo (talk) 09:38, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

The latter point, cats visible on wikipedia pages is a good idea, but with the mention cats at Commons, and with a catlink bringing you to the filepage at Commons, to avoid editing the image file at wikipedia. Programmers do your best....--Havang(nl) (talk) 16:03, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Did Robert Wilson Shufeldt's gals give him explicit written permission to photograph them nekkid?

Here's the category: Category:Robert Wilson Shufeldt. While we're at it, how about the models that posed for Category:Aphrodite, Category:Venus (dea), and Category:Female nude in paintings? I see no explicit permission from (all of) the models. They all can't be over 18, yet there is no written proof that they are. Some might be porno-graphy. I'm sure some perverts have used these images to satisfy their sick filthy lusts.

Okay, I'm joking.
Kinda.
But what is the difference between these and stuff like User:Stan Spanker's contributions?
Better than Hustler (talk) 19:43, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

That's clear that this woman is over 18... today, in 2010 lol. --GaAs11671 07:18, 15 April 2010 (UTC)
You can tell by the smile of that partially nude child that she consented.  :D  Better than Hustler (talk) 19:16, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
Actually legally, there is a big difference. These images by definition don't require records keeping (where this is unsure for material after 1995 hosted by Wikimedia). Therefore these images can only be illegal if they are of child pornography (or of child abuse). They also rather clearly have artistic properties, and probably even more so in the context of their original publication. TheDJ (talk) 20:29, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

File:Wikibooks-Gmail.png

Hey I posted this on the File talk:Wikibooks-Gmail.png but wanted to mention it here, it's in regards to the stylized "M" that is made to resemble an envelope. (→Zachary) 01:18, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

Do you think those pictures are free ?

On this page, there's an alternative Japanese poster of Seven Samurai and I was wondering if it could be uploaded on Commons just like this one. Same question of the portrait of Fumio Hayasaka (second picture of the same page) since Hayasaka died in 1955 at 41 therefore the picture may fail under {{PD-Japan-oldphoto}}.
Other website, other questions : among those archives of Kurosawa, aren't some documents free ? --TwoWings * to talk or not to talk... 16:54, 17 April 2010 (UTC)
And what about this picture ? --TwoWings * to talk or not to talk... 15:01, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

The change in the interface is coming

The usability beta has been tried out by over 970,000 users across all Wikimedia projects and roughly 80% of those beta users continue using it. See more stats about the beta analysis here. As for Commons, about 7,500 users tried out the beta as of end of February and 86% of users are still using it. The usability team is planning to roll out the current beta interface including the new toolbar as the default interface in April and May; please refer to WMF blog and the tech blog for more details.

As the acceptance rate of the beta by Commons users is relatively high, we would like to make the switch for Commons at first in the second week of April. In order to facilitate the transition and to avoid critical issues, we would like to ask as many of you as possible to try Beta before that date, so that most issues are discovered and fixed before we go default. You can opt-in via the 'Try Beta' link at the top of your interface.

We appreciate that Commons heavily relies on custom user scripts and site-specific JavaScript; Our changes are not especially related to multimedia usability, but we need your help to make sure the most used tools are compatible with the new interface. If you encounter issues using the beta, please share your feedback on the dedicated page.

Many thanks in advance. --Shuhari(Naoko Komura @ WMF) (talk) 03:27, 26 March 2010 (UTC)

Strangely enough, when I am editing in the Commons in beta mode the font size in the edit window is the same as it used to be, but when I am doing the same at the English Wikipedia the font size is smaller. Is there any way to change the font size in the edit window? — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 04:33, 26 March 2010 (UTC)
A bit more detail on this – the edit window inconsistently jumps between a larger and a smaller font size when I switch to another window and switch back. Is this a problem with Wikipedia or with my computer settings? — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 06:53, 26 March 2010 (UTC)
Have to say — make sure you don't have a non-default zoom setting for each domain… (open a page on each domain, hit CTRL+0). ¦ Reisio (talk) 07:21, 26 March 2010 (UTC)
Ah, I see. I am viewing Wikipedia using a slight zoom. It is rather annoying that the beta interface does not work with zoomed text. That would be a reason for me going back to the old interface. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 12:27, 26 March 2010 (UTC)
Hmmm, looks like the problem has been solved. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 17:36, 2 April 2010 (UTC)
Has the problem mentioned at Commons:Usability_issues_and_ideas#Vector_skin_on_Commons been fixed? -- User:Docu at 06:06, 26 March 2010 (UTC)
What is the issue there? — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 06:53, 26 March 2010 (UTC)
The CatScan link in Vector skin only displays for admins. It was mentioned on the feedback page two weeks ago, but hasn't been commented on yet. -- User:Docu at 07:02, 26 March 2010 (UTC)
We are looking into a way to restore CatScan for non-admins in Vector. We will update the progress here. --Shuhari (talk) 01:06, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

What's the deal with the specialchars buttons at the bottom of edit pages? Aren't these entirely redundant to what's in the RTE toolbar atop the edit area? ¦ Reisio (talk) 07:33, 26 March 2010 (UTC)

The plan is the built-in special character menu can replace the special characters below the editor. As the special character display is modified per project per language, we want to make sure that the special character menu in the toolbar is sufficient to replace the special character menu below. --Shuhari (talk) 20:20, 26 March 2010 (UTC)

 Question Just curious, how did you calculate the 86% acceptance rate? Are these active users of Commmons or just people that didn't switch it back here despite changing it at Wikipedia? -- User:Docu at 10:00, 26 March 2010 (UTC)

The cumulative retention rate of 86% is only for commons. We tracked the retention rate per project per language. The retention summary of Wikipedia is found here. The cumulative retention per project is found here. (Please note that the stats here is up till December, it has improved to 86% as of Feb 28, 2010) --Shuhari (talk) 02:08, 27 March 2010 (UTC)
For most projects, the approach to calculate this per project per language seems fine. For Commons, it might be worth discounting users that switched it back in other projects.
If the retention rate at Commons is as high as it suggests, I guess non-administrators are not using CatScan. This is probably bad news for our categorization system. -- User:Docu at 05:59, 27 March 2010 (UTC)
Discounting users that switched back in other projects would be the right approach to measure the precise use opt-out behavior of Commons. Unfortunately, we have not been tracking multi-project users in the beta tracking system, so it will not be possible for us to reflect that number. --Shuhari (talk) 01:15, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

 Question I rely on a lot of personal shortcut buttons defined in User:Jarekt/monobook.js. They do not show up in the new Beta skin. I copied my shortcuts to User:Jarekt/vector.js but they still do not work. How can this be fixed?--Jarekt (talk) 13:28, 26 March 2010 (UTC)

 Info You may continue to use Monobook if you want. --The Evil IP address (talk) 13:46, 26 March 2010 (UTC)
I know that. I am just trying to give vector skin a chance. So I am trying to figure out how to do some basic customizations I am used to. --Jarekt (talk) 16:24, 26 March 2010 (UTC)

 Support: A nice idea to use the Vector skin now. Users like Magnus Manske, Abigor, Ilmari Karonen and I have already copied the necessary stuff to MediaWiki:Vector.js and MediaWiki:Vector.css, and all my gadgets work the same under Vector as on Monobook. However, I believe we should hide the read link, as this one is pretty pointless here on Commons. It's good on Wikipedia, but here on Commons, you look at the images and don't read articles. Furthermore, the toolbar is quite nice for newbies, though I probably won't need it, as I recently found the nice QuickEdit. --The Evil IP address (talk) 13:46, 26 March 2010 (UTC)

Whose idea was it to change my settings? Vector as standard skin for new users may be ok but it´s an absolute no-go to compulsorily manipulate user settings... Chaddy (talk) 16:22, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

I fully agree with you. Jack ma (talk) 17:22, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
I second (third?) Chaddy on this. Why not simply invite old users to change their skin? I particularly didn't like the general look and feel of Vector and have already switched back to Monobook. Capmo (talk) 03:54, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
Have you ever changed your skin settings? Your skin should only have been changed if you haven't ever touched the skin settings. --Dinoguy1000 (talk · contribs) as 67.58.229.153 18:22, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Text in vector skin is too small when viewed in epiphany. It needs a Ctrl-+ to look the same size as vector on firefox, or monobook on any of them. Platonides (talk) 22:45, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Flickr tabs

What's happened to the Flickr-related tabs in Beta? — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 16:09, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

Figured it out. I need to create a new "vector.js" file and add the necessary script there. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 19:05, 4 April 2010 (UTC)

Sitenotice usage

As probably some people will wonder what happened to Commons's layout, I think it would be good to post something in the sitenotice so people know what's going on. Thus, I opened a section about this at MediaWiki talk:Sitenotice#Interface change. Thank you for your help and comments, --The Evil IP address (talk) 18:48, 4 April 2010 (UTC)

Help!

My condolences on the skin change. I've written a page at Meta that will hopefully alleviate some of the symptoms of the transition: m:Vector. --MZMcBride (talk) 16:04, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

Good page. You might however want to mention the fact that MediaWiki:Vector-namespace-main needs the same content as MediaWiki:Nstab-main, which many wikis probably haven't yet done (see en:MediaWiki talk:Vector-namespace-main for more information). --The Evil IP address (talk) 16:31, 5 April 2010 (UTC)
I never noticed that the background was a book. Nice to know, thanks! ;-) --Kjetil_r 10:23, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

OMG OMG! So cute! I breathlessly await the next change over, with the fluffy bunnies running through the text. Now, the only important thing: How does one get Monobook back? And I mean both in one’s personal settings (easy), and as the wp default too. Obviously the ppl pushing for this new skin change are the kind of morons with no place whatsoever in wp and should go play cutesy pixels in Wikia or some corporate outlet. I expect donations to plummet in reply to this change — I’m sure I'll be doing my part. Tuvalkin (talk) 09:28, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

usability:What's new, questions and answers might have some of the answers which you seek. It's not directly written about Vector, but the new skin is a result of the usability initiative. Killiondude (talk) 18:08, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
Yeah, been there. Tuvalkin (talk) 00:17, 7 April 2010 (UTC) (pukes)
The "people pushing for this new skin" deserve the same respect as any other Wikimedian, and it is completely unacceptable for you to use personal attacks. Constructive feedback is appreciated; calling people morons is not. Consider this the only warning you will get. guillom 20:35, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

Popups and random language site notice

Firstly, my very first impression of the new skin is that it's OK, but my popups no longer work, and can't find any options to set them in the preferences.

Secondly, the sitenotice about the changes seems to change language very third time I view a page - initially it was in English (the language I have my interface set to), then it was Russian, now it's in French. Thryduulf (talk) 10:20, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

For the first question, you must move or copy your /monobook.js to /vector.js, so that it doesn't only work on the monobook skin. --The Evil IP address (talk) 10:35, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
Yeah, the LangSwitch thing is very strange. I tried centering the sitenotice last night and it turned French for English users. As far as the vector.js thing, an easy solution is posted on m:Vector#How do I import my monobook.js subpage?. Killiondude (talk) 18:03, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
Krinkle has apparently found a fix for this at MediaWiki:Vector.js. This thing might be useful for future sitenotices (if it works). --The Evil IP address (talk) 18:19, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
Like some other MediaWiki-namespace related things, the Sitenotice is cached for all visitors. Therefor a LangSwitch does not work the way one would expect. So the version as it was last viewed when it's being cached is what everybody would see. The script I made will work for future Sitenotices aswell, it's fairly dynamic as long as the langSwitch is used in the Sitenotice. The only downside about it (about JavaScript in general) is that it loads client-side, in other words after the page has loaded. This means that depending on a lot of factors (browser, computer, internet etc.) you might see see a short flash/snap of another language (the one that was wrongly cached). –Krinkletalk 01:32, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

Changes to MonoBook skin

I was avoiding vector skin because I have never figured out how to customize the toolbar above edit window. So yesterday I switched back to the Monobook skin, but unfortunately that did not changed the look of the toolbar above edit window. Is there an option somewhere to use the old style edit window with monobook skin? Or even better did anybody successfully customized the new toolbar above the edit window? --Jarekt (talk) 13:39, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

IMy question was answered here. --Jarekt (talk) 13:43, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Slower

I tried it and find it slower, mainly when categorising many photos one after one. Because the edit window loads slowly, I often click on the wrong place. I returned to Monobook. Regards, Jack ma (talk) 13:48, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

I agree with Jack ma, it is slower than Monobook. Each page I have to wait one or two seconds for the tab bar to organise itself before I felt safe enough to click on anything. I changed my preferences back to Monobook so I'm now indifferent to this change (I have used Vector at other times though and did not notice the strange tab bar "fidgeting" earlier). -84user (talk) 20:20, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
I used to use the Monobook skin. I am trying the "Classic" skin right now, trying to reduce the javascript burden on my computer, and I must say that the fact that the categories are shown above the picture, is a good solution when working on picture categorization. Teofilo (talk) 07:23, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
I agree with Jack ma. The edit window can take up to 15 seconds to load on my computer (FF 3.6/Windows XP). I counted. Obviously, this is unusable when one edits a lot. The browsing experience is pleasing, though. Jastrow (Λέγετε) 14:47, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
Less than 2 seconds for me on this section (FF 3.6/Windows XP). 15 seconds is what I had 3 years ago on fr.wp (so with monobook). --GaAs11671 15:33, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
That issue seems to be separate from the skin setting. Uncheck "Enable enhanced editing toolbar" at "Editing" in Preferenes. --AVRS (talk) 12:13, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
I was wondering, because I use Vector on Wikipedia with no apparent lag. I unchecked the enhanced editing toolbar and it's much better now. Thanks. Jastrow (Λέγετε) 14:12, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

Cat-a-lot doesn't work

As the title says. Maybe it's just my memory, but I think the Vector skin looked better on en.Wikipedia than here. And I don't like the "topless" tabs. Back to Monoskin for now. Paradoctor (talk) 14:21, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

If you append ?useskin=vector to the URL of any Wikimedia site, you can view what that page looks like with vector enabled, so you can do a quick comparison in two different windows of what Commons and enwiki would look like in vector. I think one difference is that yesterday Commons (did) have more tabs than enwiki, but I think that may have changed. I'm not sure. Killiondude (talk) 18:01, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
Damn, it's my memory! Paradoctor (talk) 18:41, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Colour of links

Links appear in 2 different blue colours since the change in the interface. Is that normal ? --TwoWings * to talk or not to talk... 15:00, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Yes. This differentiates links you've visited from those you haven't. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 16:29, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
Yeah I realized that after I posted this message. But there is still something strange to me because it's almost the exact contrary compare to the 2 different blue colours that were used before to differentiate the previously visited links from other links. Which is quite disturbing... --TwoWings * to talk or not to talk... 08:06, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

Problems with edit box

First off, I was not using the monobook skin before, and am not using the vector skin now. However, I'm still affected, since every time I try to edit something, the browser window freezes up for about 15 seconds AFTER everything has been loaded, and doesn't permit me to do anything until after this annoying wait has finished. If this interface were to be adopted for Wikipedia, then Wikipedia would become almost unusable for me. Also, I'm getting the sitenotice-in-completely-random-language problem referred to above. AnonMoos (talk) 17:32, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Go to your preferences under "Editing" and uncheck the two boxes of "Beta tabs". The second problem has been fixed. --The Evil IP address (talk) 20:14, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
The browser-freeze problem seemed to go down from 15 seconds of freeze to 5 seconds, but I'm better off without it, thanks... AnonMoos (talk) 22:50, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Fade to white

Why do the tabs fade off into nothing? It's impossible for users to see where the button ends. That's pretty bad UI design. Other than that, it looks OK. Gigs (talk) 21:21, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, I like topless, but not on my buttons. Paradoctor (talk) 21:33, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Functionality issues

The skin hides some pretty basic functionality - the watch button - way too well. A star is not obviously connected to watching a page. Also, it shoves the administrator functions into a drop-down menu, which isn't good for dealing systematically with large numbers of issues. If this is going to be the default skin, mysterious buttons (the star) need to go, replaced with something explicit, and we need to make sure that users gaining adminship don't find themselves used to a setup that has suddenly become sub-optimal - the drop down needs to change. Adam Cuerden (talk) 21:29, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

How about replacing the star with an eye?KTo288 (talk) 14:45, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

Toolbarbuttons

Some users have said to no longer see their custom edit buttons in the toolbar. There is 1 reason for this and 2 solutions. First the reason; Vector by default enables the Advanced toolbar. This means the new lightblue toolbar with all that comes with it. But since it's a different toolbaar it has a different set of tools.

  • Solution 1: Switch back to the old toolbar; Special:Preferences => Editing => Beta features => [ ] "Enable enhanced editing toolbar"
    This shows the old toolbar again and (if you copied/imported your script to the good location (User:(name)/vector.js)) thuss the script works again the same way it did in Monobook.
  • Solution 2: Use the new syntax
    • For the techies read here here all about it
    • For those who just want to put buttons on about the same place, use importScript('User:Krinkle/insertVectorButtons.js'); and add them using the following syntax in your vector.js. You'll notice it's a lot like the monobook-way when you import the above script:
function kCustomMainInsertButton_config(){
// Welcome + Sandbox :
kCustomMainInsertButton(
	'welcometest1', //imageId
	'http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/b4/Gtk-dialog-info.svg/22px-Gtk-dialog-info.svg.png', //imageFile
	'Welcome + Sandbox', //speedTip
	'{\{Welcome}\}\n\n{\{subst:test|', //tagOpen
	'}\}\~\~\~\~', //tagClose
	'' //sampleText
);
// Test2
kCustomMainInsertButton(
	'test2', //imageId
	'http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/f7/Nuvola_apps_important.svg/22px-Nuvola_apps_important.svg.png', //imageFile
	'Test2', //speedTip
	'{\{subst:test2|', //tagOpen
	'}\}\~\~\~\~', //tagClose
	'', //sampleText
	//callbackFunc:
	function(){ $j("#wpSummary").val("/* Vandalism is not appreciated */ new section"); }
);

}
Greetings, –Krinkletalk 00:19, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

Hard edges and boxes

It doesn't affect functionality, I guess the designers were aiming for an open, airy, unconstrained feel, but as someone who likes to put things in boxes their removal from the side bar and and the blending of the light blue to white at the top of the screen is for want of a word disconcerting. KTo288 (talk) 23:42, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

If you prefer to have the sidebar-boxes as boxes and not have airy space on top, the following might be what you're looking for in your vector.css:
#page-base { height: 3.6em; } #left-navigation { top: 1.1em; } #right-navigation { margin-top: 1.1em; }
#panel div.portal div.body { border: 1px solid #eee; background-color: white; padding: 0.5em; }
–Krinkletalk 00:25, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
I like the open feeling—I hope that if there's a decision to move to closed boxes the option of open boxes will remain. Nihiltres(t.c) 03:32, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
Saved myself the trouble and went back to the old default.KTo288 (talk) 14:45, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

Tab-bar-to-menu collapse routine chokes on custom tabs

I'm using Safari 4.0.4 (6531.21.10) on Mac OS 10.6.2 and I'm noticing a problem with the tabs: if I resize the window in such a way that tabs should collapse into the drop-down menu, the menu appears, but no tabs are moved to it. This is roughly consistent with my experience with Vector on enwiki, where my custom JavaScript-added tabs, and my custom JavaScript moving of tabs out of the menu (see w:en:User:Nihiltres/nothingthree.js) each have issues with automatic shuffling in or out of the menu.

My JS-fu is not strong enough to understand properly the jQuery or whatever it is that runs the collapsing routine, but since it's (presumably) affecting a large number of users on Commons, it should be a priority for fixing. Ideally, there should be ways to move, add, and remove tabs using JavaScript that don't break the collapsing routine. Perhaps a tweak to addPortletLink() would help? Nihiltres(t.c) 03:32, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

Make sure class="collapsible" is set on the <li>. MediaWiki:Extra-tabs.js already does this, not sure about addPortletLink(). --Catrope (talk) 08:58, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
addPortletLink() doesn't currently do this, although you can easily add the class yourself, like this:
var tab = addPortletLink('p-views', url, etc);
tab.className += " collapsible";
// or just addPortletLink('p-views', url, etc).className += " collapsible";
However, this seems like a silly design decision in the Vector skin: if the sensible state for most tabs in the p-views portlet is to be collapsible, then that should be the default, and the few tabs that shouldn't be collapsible should be marked with something like class="nocollapse". —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 19:02, 15 April 2010 (UTC)
From a design standpoint, the views were not supposed to be collapsible unless horizontal space absolutely required it. Also, originally, actions and added portletlinks were not supposed to be shown as tabs, but to be listed in the menus. I have pointed out the current situation to the usability team btw, and they will be looking into this problem again. TheDJ (talk) 00:01, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
I think you mean "were not supposed to be collapsed", right? There's a difference. But anyway, I guess it's easy enough to say now in hindsight that of course most people want their custom tabs to be collapsible now that it's possible. On the other hand, the Vector skin itself seems to have a total of two collapsible tabs ("Add section" and "View history"), so I can see they might've seemed like the exception rather than the rule. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 01:20, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Commonist

I couldn't log in using Commonist today.[25] Walter Siegmund (talk) 03:12, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

This is unrelated to Vector. See #Commonist and Google Maps issues below. guillom 20:38, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

Medium/larger/largest characters

I use IE6 on a high resolution screen (1800 x 1200) on a laptop and I use normally View/text size/Larger for best readability. The larger and Largest fonts on the vector skin are gigantic and not usable, except for the edit box where the size setting seems not to have an impact. --Foroa (talk) 05:51, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

There is a note on MediaWiki talk:Vector.css that might address this. -- User:Docu at 07:29, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
Thank you. There seems to be more than one problem. Anyway, for people with (very) high resolution screens, the vector skin is not usable as it is now (and everywhere where it is the default, such as in Bugzilla). --Foroa (talk) 08:18, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
I applied the suggestion from MediaWiki talk:Vector.css. Hopefully it helps. Raymond 08:57, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

These statistics are meaningless

86% of testing users have not switched back, so what ? Have you never heard about the placebo effect ? Your stats merely mean that your new skin is harmless (not exactly that, actually, because perhaps a number of people never come again after "testing") for a majority of testers, but it does not mean that it is better. How about providing a Monobook beta test, with the same amount of advertising about the qualities of Monobook, and let's see how many people switch back to Vector ! And anyway, even if these statistics were meaningful, they would not be democratic. A democracy supposes a vote of the whole community, not a survey of a self-appointed survey group. Some users who enjoy your new skin for themselves might vote against it, out of concern for the other people for whom it brings trouble, because they are not selfish. But you are making selfishness and majority crushing the minorities the core values of the Wikimedia projects. How nice! Teofilo (talk) 12:43, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

Vector footprint. lolGaAs11671 15:44, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
100% of myself never switched back after testing vector. --GaAs11671 13:51, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
Take a sample of people who drink water at lunch and propose them to drink wine instead. How many people will switch back to water one or two months later ? This is just an addiction phenomenon, but it is not necessarily good for their health (so I might even have been wrong to write harmless above). Do we have a comparison of the carbon footprint of the new Vector skin compared to the Monobook skin ? Teofilo (talk) 14:50, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
First, that water/wine argument is invalid, because it's equally reasonable to reverse the argument and suggest that people are "addicted" to Monobook. Vector is based on making things friendlier for new users, for whom the changes are experimentally validated improvements. Second, the change is not "majority crushing the minorities" because everyone's free to change back to Monobook and disable the other upgrades if they so desire. I have no idea how the "carbon footprint" of Vector vs. Monobook is at all relevant (while a smaller one is certainly desirable, we're discussing MediaWiki usability, not environmental sustainability :P).
Finally, I agree that the statistics given are meaningless in some regards, but the reverse statistics would be equally meaningless. If you can propose a better metric, I'm sure it would be a welcome development. Nihiltres(t.c) 16:58, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
If the interface wasn't so slow and buggy, one could actually compare their aesthetics. This is genuinely painful to use... which is sad as it genuinely looks like a better design (a bit like Wordpress, actually.) I am actually having to slow down my typing so that it doesn't confuse the poor thing. And everyone's not free to do that, as Commons:FAQ says: "Press "Save setting" and the old design is sort of back. Edit window remains changed." So we are forced to use this hopelessly inferior (in a coding sense) design - the change management is just absent, entirely absent. Orderinchaos (talk) 18:34, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
Go to preferences edit tab, uncheck "use new form layout". Works even if you keep Vector skin. --GaAs11671 23:49, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
No no no. Uncheck the two checkboxes in the "Beta features" section. Leave the "use new form layout" alone; that refers to the upload form layout. I'm going to change that label in a second. Lupo 07:09, 8 April 2010 (UTC)
You can also uncheck just "Show edit toolbar". -- User:Docu at 07:32, 8 April 2010 (UTC)
@Lupo: no, I tested it, it changed the edit form back to old toolbar. --GaAs11671 08:36, 8 April 2010 (UTC)
Thanks very much - I got my edit window back! :) Very much appreciate the assistance. Orderinchaos (talk) 12:05, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

The aforementioned statistics are biased in their very root because only progressive/curious people (more prone to voluntarily try and accept new things) clicked on the Try Beta link. The resulting high acceptance ratio in this group is no surprise. But those conservative, satisfied with the interface or shy of technical novelties (myself being one of them) never considered even clicking and trying it. Instead of so heavily exploited 86 % I would like to know also the acceptance/refusal ratio among those unwilingly pressed into trying by recent general switch. That's why I feel need to express my doubts about planning and decision methods used during implementing of Vector. Such a noble project like Wikimedia deserves something more than biased stats. --Miaow Miaow (talk) 21:09, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

ko, zh, ja, de, pl etc... language communities related issues

You provide us with this link (beta feedback survey) which shows a number of specific issues in different languages (German words are too long, japanese fonts are too small, Korean users dislike the skin... etc...). Commons is an international place. Yet you want to impose that skin regardless of these issues ??? Teofilo (talk) 15:58, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

Yes, some users of the individual language wikis have expressed issues with parts of the beta. We'll be working with these communities over the next several weeks to better understand their reactions to the beta. I'll update this thread as things progress. Howief (talk) 21:37, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
Improvements to the beta such as collapsible tabs was introduced to accommodate long words such as German in October. After this improvement, the acceptance from German Wikipedia improved. --Shuhari (talk) 06:40, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

Broken for certain classes of disabled users

I have a visual-coordination deficiency (in essence, I have more eyesight in one eye than the other, and my ability to assess detail is limited). As such I very rarely use the mouse and instead use keyboard commands as I "touch type". The Java code on this editing interface is so heavy and sluggish that when keyboard commands (eg Ctrl-left/right arrow, Ctrl-C/X/V/Insert/Home etc) are used, they take half a second or more to respond, and more often than not flipping back into the section from another page leaves me at the top of the section instead of the cursor position, as the browser (Mozilla 3.6 on Win XP) effectively has no control of the interface. On three occasions tonight I have lost significant blocks of text as the interface has just randomly decided to "reload" the original state of the window while I am typing. These are clearly bugs in the design that have not been picked up due to a limited beta testing population, I would say - but enough for me to say I don't want to be a guinea pig for this design any longer. If you like it, great - use it. But can the editing (as opposed to merely viewing) functionality for monobook please be turned back on for those of us who want it? I note that en.wiki has done this, so it's not a technical impossibility. Orderinchaos (talk) 18:28, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

Certainly. Go to preferences, and under Appearance, select "MonoBook". Under Editing, unselect both options under Beta Features. This should return you to the original setup. I've done this as well, both for familiarity and speed reasons. — Huntster (t @ c) 23:09, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
Aha! Thank you very much - that works. I will keep an eye out to see if the other one improves as it does seem to be a big step forward overall. Orderinchaos (talk) 12:04, 8 April 2010 (UTC)
And to think that vector is part of a usability campaign. --89.246.214.31 10:25, 8 April 2010 (UTC)
You confuse accessibility with usability. They are related and definitely influence each other, but they are different things. TheDJ (talk) 14:25, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

Upload problems

Apologies if this has already been reported. I'm having two problems when using the basic upload form with Vector, using FF3.6 on Vista:

  1. Uploaded files are not automatically added to my watchlist, even though I have ticked the preference "Add pages I create to my watchlist". Sure, I can tick a box on the upload form, but I'll forget to do it half the time.
  2. The name of the uploaded file is wrong: even if I change the name of the file in the "Destination filename" box, the file gets uploaded under the local filename. Pruneautalk 08:55, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
The latter issue might be a problem with the mwEmbed gadget. We saw a similar issue on enwp, and Micheal Dale will fix it as soon as possible. So check if you have that Gadget enabled, and try recreating the problem without mwEmbed enabled, to determin if this is a Vector issue or an upload form issue or an mwEmbed issue. TheDJ (talk) 14:28, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

Bug relating to watching new files as default

I don't know whether or not this relates to the recent change to Vector, but I've noticed today that the default has changed from newly uploaded files being automatically set to watched to having to click a tick box. This is despite having set & reset my preferences to watch such files. Espresso Addict (talk) 19:48, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

I don't think the change you see is related with Vector, as I see both Monobook and Vector has the Watch this file" unchecked for newly uploaded file. --Shuhari (talk) 19:50, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

Global Usage

HAs been moved to a tab the requires Java enabled, can it get reversed to being at the end of the file with no Java requirements. Current using the Vector skin on en.wikipedia the gobal usage is still on the File page. For the record I've tried under both the vector and the monobook skins here, I reverted to the monobook its a lot friendlier when working with images where as vector is better on en for working with articles. Being able to easily access Global usage is extremely important for DR discussions, we shouldnt be enacting an function that stiffles or restricts a persons ability to discuss the status of files. Gnangarra 01:41, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

It seems to be back again, not sure if this was Vector related. –Krinkletalk 23:27, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
This was solved and not a vector issue. See also: Commons:Village_pump#File_Usage. TheDJ (talk) 23:55, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

Vector edit buttoms in monobook skin

Hi, I have changed back to monobook skin in my preferences as I doesnt feel good in vector skin, but there is still vector like edit bottons. How I can swich back to monobook javascript? And why vector is not just a new skin available from preferences, but forced via this way?--Juan de Vojníkov (talk) 06:38, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

Finnaly found a way no meta how to do so.--Juan de Vojníkov (talk) 11:10, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

Huge font in interProject

I think interProject link is too big in Vector skin. It need to be smaller. – Kwj2772 (msg) 11:57, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

Now it seems to be fixed. – Kwj2772 (msg) 15:58, 15 April 2010 (UTC)
The old interProject code did some rather silly things with portlets (bascially trying to nest one portlet inside another) which more or less worked on MonoBook (with sufficient CSS klugery) but broke badly on Vector. I rewrote it a bit more sanely as MediaWiki:InterProject.js and removed the old code. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 18:44, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

From Monobook to Vector — and back again

I think it is a shame the project changed the default skin to Vector, especially as participation in the usability initiative was, not surprisingly, overly represented by that familiar minority demographic — our most dedicated, extreme users of the project — while occasional users and new users got hardly a look in (and we cannot blame them for that). It is also ironic that the change arose from a usability initiative, whereas Vector is overall less usable than Monobook for people with special needs.

There are several examples, one of which (I don't have the time right now to detail the other usability deteriorations) is that the presentation of tab-style buttons at the top of every page is poorly designed, e.g. it suffers from bad coordination of the different elements, among other design issues. Worse, it also uses a presentation of the tab-style buttons which slides from right to left at high speed every time one reads or edits a new page; this moving presentation is positively unhelpful to readers with visual-field-defects. It provides almost no useful information, and is even distracting.

I could go on, but, really, there is no need and, as I said, I don't have time, so I will have to leave it to others; anybody with visual design experience should be able to explain how, and why, Monobook exceeds Vector. Due to lack of time, this will probably be my only comment.

I sincerely hope that Monobook will be restored as the default skin, at least for unregistered anonymous users and for users who did not choose a preferred skin. 85.94.185.31 01:32, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

I dont like the new skin too. I want my Monobook back. I think with Vector I will stop my work for Wikipedia and Commons. --95.33.172.1 18:10, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
The described problem stems from the choice of the Commons community to not have the links in the dropdown menu. The sliding of the links is something that was originally designed to just occur when the size of the page required it. This might be further improved in the future. TheDJ (talk) 19:43, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
The sliding animation is quite distracting, particularly since IME it tends to be rather slow and jerky. I haven't seen the code (and wouldn't really know where to start looking for it), but surely it would be easier to just make the excess tabs collapse directly into the menu without any animation? —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 18:36, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

Upload new version only works when "Ignore any warnings" is clicked

See the complaints here and here. Unless "Ignore any warnings" is toggled on, attempting to replace a file with a new version leads to endless frustration.--ragesoss (talk) 13:38, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

This is most likely due to the MediaWiki code update deployed a few days ago on all Wikimedia projects, and not to the new skin. guillom 14:51, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
Correct. The change was made primarily because "ignore all warnings" used to be "permanent" on the reupload page. Unfortunately that led to many issues (people uploading bmp files on top of jpg/png what ever for instance). Ideally the reupload page just ignores "already a file at this location", but i'm not sure if this is possible atm. Please open a bug ticket if you desire this. TheDJ (talk) 15:27, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
When you reupload a file, the destination file warning is skipped now. TheDJ (talk) 15:12, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

Favicon

I noticed that the favicon is not working properly. It actually is assigned to this wiki, but fully transparent. Is this a bug, or did Commons not have a favicon before?--85.146.52.36 16:58, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

I see no issue with the favicon. Killiondude (talk) 18:39, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
I can't see the favicon in Safari 4 or Chrome 4, for Mac. I can see it in Firefox though.—Totie (talk) 23:09, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

Tab for uploads

I usually use the "tab" buton to navigate the upload form. One issue I have is that now, when I want to get from the "permission" field to the categories, I have to "tab" my way through the entire special chars menu (or of course, use the dreaded "cursor"). It would be neat if the "tab" could skip the special chars on its way down towards the "upload" button. V85 (talk) 11:18, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

I have made this request. bugzilla:23238 TheDJ (talk) 19:11, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Broken small gif animations

There are also a lot of small gif animation scaled to a static thumbnail. If I ask a new size, the new thumbnail works. For other examples take a look at Category:Animations for physics and other animation cats.

thumb|160px|160px thumb|161px|161px thumb|107px|107px thumb|110px|110px
thumb|120px|120px thumb|121px|121px thumb|38px|38px thumb|39px|39px

Are these thumbnail going to be mass-purged? Thanks. -- Basilicofresco (msg) 06:16, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Probably a problem of cache after some modification in the software (at the moment for me all your examples are working except the 38px one). So just wait and see. --GaAs11671 07:50, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
I purged File:Simple harmonic oscillator.gif and now the 38px works here. --GaAs11671 09:54, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
I made the same thing with File:Simple Harmonic Motion Orbit.gif on en:Simple harmonic motion: (1) click on "purge" tab on Commons (2) purge navigator with CTRL-F5 on the article, and now it works. --GaAs11671 10:00, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
I mean... should we check every animation and manually purge them? Please note, there are a lot of broken thumbnails. Basilicofresco (msg) 10:39, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
I hope not. I did it only for one of those you put here. --GaAs11671 10:55, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
If they are broken, then yes, you will have to manually purge them. TheDJ (talk) 12:13, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
Basilicofresco. Concerning categories such as the one you linked to (Category:Abstract Animation), you will have to bypass your browser cache (Ctrl-F5 on Firefox) on the category page itself in order to see any new thumbnails that have been generated. Almost all the thumbnails are animated now at Category:Abstract Animation. --Timeshifter (talk) 13:44, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

I created User:TheDJ/CatPurge.js which allows you to purge all images in a category. Went trough many of the larger GIF animation categories already. The script isn't very communicative btw and I don't advise you to use it unless you know a bit about scripts and API. And be careful with directories that contain a lot of ogg thumbnails, due to the current ogg thumbing bug. TheDJ (talk) 17:48, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

I replaced the embedded GIFs with ":" links, in order to save the user downloading 1.5 megabytes each time. They all look working now. See below, Commons:Village pump#The village pump is too heavy. -84user (talk) 14:02, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Mistake

Is it mistake, that File:Tours - vitrail du choeur.jpg is in Commons:Quality images/Subject/Animals/Arthropods#Butterflies and Moths (Lepidoptera) (second photo in division)? 91.77.239.25 08:03, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Probably a mistake. I have moved File:Tours - vitrail du choeur.jpg from Commons:Quality images/Subject/Animals/Arthropods/Butterflies and Moths (Lepidoptera) to Commons:Quality images/Subject/Works of art/Sample. -84user (talk) 13:39, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Upload form behavior

See this screenshot. Every time I upload a new version of a file, the upload form gets a new, empty column to the left of the fields. Is this a known bug? I use Opera 10.10 in Ubuntu. Regards, --Kjetil_r 17:49, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

This is related to Commons:Village_pump#Upload_broken.3F. TheDJ (talk) 19:02, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Video thumbnails corrupt since 9 April

Between 03:23, 8 April 2010 and 08:40, 9 April 2010 (maybe since the new vector skin was enabled or the animated GIF rescaling was enabled?), new video uploads started to render with empty or corrupt thumbnails (Firefox, Google Chrome, Opera and Safari, with cache and file purging; thumbtime also tested). New uploads are still rendering incorrectly. I have eliminated file corruption because the file uploaded is identical to the file on my PC (I download the file from mediawiki and use emacs to compare). Where should I report this?

All files are correct on my PC playing in Firefox, Media Player Classic and VLC. -84user (talk) 20:55, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

I have opened bugzilla:23160 for this problem. -84user (talk) 22:41, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
The empty frames are just because there are no Keyframes following the search point that can be decoded. We should probably put a limit on the "mid" point of 10 seconds or something and use frame 0 for other cases. TheDJ (talk) 22:56, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
The errors were retrieved by opening the image url in it's own window btw. TheDJ (talk) 22:57, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
Very interesting. To the above table I have added some more short videos with various keyframe distributions but get inconsistent results. -84user (talk) 01:23, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

Questions: I noticed Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)#Garbled video thumbnails Wikipedia:Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)/Archive 74#Garbled video thumbnails links here and refers to File:Dmitry Medvedev - 2010 Polish Air Force Tu-154 crash.ogv as having a garbled thumbnail. The first two uploads of that video had garbled thumbnails but the third produced a good thumbnail.

Is there a way to reproduce this success? I have just tried some re-encodings of that video and still get garbled thumbnails.

My second question is whether we could use a template to workaround the problem? I made Wikipedia:User:84user/Thumbnail as an experiment to see how a separate thumbnail image can be used in place of the garbled one, and although it looks Ok, it does not behave exactly the same as an embedded video. See mockups and examples at Wikipedia:User:84user/sandbox. I am also following progress on bugzilla:23160 and hope there will be some resolution to this, as I was hoping to upload conversions of animated GIFs that get used a lot at Wikipedia. -84user (talk) 16:52, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

When the code is reviewed, hopefully the old thumbnailing code for ogg/theora will be restored this week. TheDJ (talk) 01:16, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Upload broken?

I am trying to re-upload an image which I has been previously deleted. I believe I should be getting a warning page and be asked if I really want to do the upload. I think that page flashes up and is immediately replaced by the upload page with the following cryptic message at the top:

— RHaworth (Talk | contribs) 12:34, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

The fix for this was deployed a few minutes ago. Not withstanding that, it is still a mess. I propose to disable all Commons specific javascript tools for the upload form. The thing has changed so much in MediaWiki 1.16 that all scripts require re testing before they can be working in my opinion. On my Safari 4 i now see this: http://imagebin.ca/view/62JRBng.html and this http://imagebin.ca/view/w7HBVUy.html
So that is double warnings, "Nan" before an error and disabled upload buttons, during my "reupload". TheDJ (talk) 13:34, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
I think that could be a good idea. A generic upload interface that works is still better than a customized one that doesn't. We can re-enable the local customizations after all the incompatibilities have been worked out. Unfortunately, I'm not particularly familiar with that part of our site JavaScript, or I'd just do it myself. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 16:45, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
Shouldn't it be the other way round? -- User:Docu at 11:46, 15 April 2010 (UTC)
What ? I'm unsure what you are trying to convey. TheDJ (talk) 14:14, 15 April 2010 (UTC)
I assume that what Docu is suggesting is that the changes to the upload interface in MW 1.16 should be reverted until they're compatible with the local JS-based enhancements on Commons. While I don't entirely agree, I would note that he does have a point: Commons is the central file repository for all Wikimedia wikis, and so a change to the upload interface that improves it for all other wikis, but degrades it for Commons, may not really be a net usability improvement for Wikimedia. Thus, it would make sense (given that MediaWiki, and the Usability Initiative in particular, are primarily developed for and by Wikimedia) for all changes to upload and file handling in general to be tested for compatibility with Commons before actual deployment.
The problem with all this, of course, is that I don't think all the tweaks and improvements we've made to the MediaWiki upload interface here on Commons are available as a convenient bundle that one could easily install on a test wiki. Thus, it's hard to test their compatibility with new MW features, except by deploying the new feature on Commons itself. That said, even without such a bundle, some other testing methods ought to be possible. For example, the Usability Initiative already has a bunch of prototype sites for testing interface changes, showing the content (and, I believe, any local JS/CSS tweaks) of various Wikipedias with a development version of the interface. I don't immediately see any reason why such a prototype interface couldn't be set up for Commons too. --Ilmari Karonen (talk) 18:48, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
Perhaps, but such tests would work as a limiting factor on the development effort I think. I certainly wouldn't want to descend into that. Anyway, Lupo seems MIA, so if someone can comment "enableNewUploadForm()" from MediaWiki:Common.js, then at least we have mostly working code again. I'll see if I can find some of the problems. TheDJ (talk) 19:00, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
Nan issue fixed. UploadForm disabled. /me hacking at it. TheDJ (talk) 19:51, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
Uploadform re enabled. Seems to mostly work. The issue with the disable buttons only occurs if other scripts break, the issue with double inclusion is mitigated by the fact that reupload no longer warns and as such should no longer occur. Field verification works in Safari/Firefox/Opera. There is one issue with reupload, where sometimes it doesn't select the proper upload form mode, but I don't know how to fix that. It isn't as serious, so i'll let Lupo look at that. TheDJ (talk) 20:48, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Help with a special category needed

Hi!

This category (name: "9P133 Malyutka at the Technical Museum in Togliatti, Russia"). The name of this category is not satisficing: Too long and a little too precise for only one image in it. Can anyone change it into a Commons-conform, better name, please? Gui 13:43, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Why not just move the files in all those "Whatever in Technical museum Togliatti" categories into the parent cats? Or maybe create some intermediate categories like Category:Tanks in Technical museum Togliatti and Armoured cars in Technical museum Togliatti, if the main Category:Technical museum Togliatti would otherwise get too large. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 11:59, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Error in Gallery since yesterday night

"A database error has occurred Query: SELECT cl_to as cat FROM categorylinks LEFT JOIN u_daniel_cache.commonswiki_nontopics ON namespace = 14 AND title = cl_to where cl_from = 10041195 AND id IS NULL Function: getCategories Error: 1146 Table 'u_daniel_cache.commonswiki_nontopics' doesn't exist (sql-s4) " --Mbdortmund (talk) 14:51, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

That error is in the toolserver, not in Wikimedia Commons. You should report it to Duesentrieb, which is the daniel user mentioned in the error. Platonides (talk) 20:17, 18 April 2010 (UTC)


It was probably due to the mysqld error on hyacinth. However, cassia is supposed to have taken its role, so it shouldn't (as it does) continue giving that error :/ Platonides (talk) 21:07, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
can't find a user named "cassia" --Mbdortmund (talk) 04:38, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
lol See https://wiki.toolserver.org/view/Servers --GaAs11671 10:00, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Possible licence violation problem

Please somebody check images uploaded by this user: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/Mladifilozof - Note that this user is well known for trolling, POV pushing and disruption in Serbian Wikipedia and therefore I suspect that he uploading images with false licences. I will give you example: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:War_Illustrated_-_Serbia_012.jpg - for example, this user uploaded this image claiming that author is unknown, but used licence "a copyright term of life of the author plus 70 years". Since image was created in 1915, we cannot be sure that this is correct licence (if author of this image was, let say, 30 years old when he created this image and if he was, let say, 70 years old when he died, then licence "70 years after his death" cannot be used before 2025, not to mention what would be starting date for usage of this licence if author of the image had 80 or 85 years when he died). It is not only problem with this image since user:Mladifilozof uploaded a dozen of images with similar licence problems and this certainly should be checked by somebody who is concerned about copyright problems in Wikimedia. PANONIAN (talk) 22:59, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

April 19

SVG checker

It's from last week the http://validator.w3.org/ SVG validator doesn't work any more. For instance, for this file I checked some days ago, I now get this error: "500 Can't connect to localhost:8888 (connect: Connection refused)". Anybody knows What happens? --Aldoaldoz (talk) 06:05, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

I tried it with the file you linked above: This document was successfully checked as SVG 1.1+IRI, XHTML5+ARIA plus MathML 2.0 (experimental)! → works. --El Grafo (talk) 09:18, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Freedom-of-Information-release = PD-USGov?

Does the "Freedom of Information"-release of a recent photo shot by an official of the NYPD, such as File:11 Septemper attack WTC burning.jpg, translate to PD-USGov? --Túrelio (talk) 09:11, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

I wonder too. The rational given by the template ('work of the United States Federal Government') obviously not applies, also nothing like that is mentioned in COM:L#Works_by_the_US_Government nor en:Copyright status of work by the U.S. government. --Martin H. (talk) 10:40, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
No. http://www.justice.gov/oip/foia_updates/Vol_IV_4/page3.htm Actually, agencies are actually asked to carefully consider commercial value of the material in their possession and can actively protect it if needed. Most uses of FOIA accessible copyrighted material would fall under Fair Use apparently. Seperately from that, I'm not sure what the copyright status of NYPD material normally is. TheDJ (talk) 10:51, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
We could, presumably, ask the NYPD. Adam Cuerden (talk) 16:55, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Austro-Hungarian barracks

Could somebody join or solve and close the discussion Commons:Categories for discussion/2010/01/Category:Barracks of the former Austro-Hungarian army until 1918? It is cornered and neglected hinherto. --ŠJů (talk) 15:20, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Deletion request -> Request for community review

The recent drama at AN/U suggests that "deletion requests" are apt to be taken personally by uploaders. Have we ever discussed renaming deletion requests to something less likely to set up an adversarial relationship between uploader and nominator?

If we called it "Request for community review", for example, it would emphasise that the community will take the decision, putting the responsibility where it belongs. It's only changing words, but "Request for community review" happens to be a good and accurate description of what follows when a deletion request is made, and the change in wording might help contribute to a mellower discussion. Thoughts? --JN466 21:52, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

You might have a point. But we should make sure that everyone understands that the file might be deleted so it has to be taken serious. Also if it is called a review we might get more requests than before. You know: "I'm not sure so lets have a review" does not sound as serious as "I think this file should be deleted". We could start by looking at the templates to see if they could be improved. --MGA73 (talk) 21:58, 17 April 2010 (UTC)
We could change the wording in the templates, but keep the names of the pages. I did that once on Wiktionnaire, saying sthing like "There is a discussion about keeping or not this page" rather than "Someone has asked for the deletion of this page". --GaAs11671 10:10, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
Sounds good. The current template wording is,
This media file has been nominated for deletion since [date]. To discuss it, please go here. Do not remove this tag until the deletion request is closed. Reason for the deletion request:
We could change this to:
A community discussion on whether this media file should be kept in Commons was initiated on [date]. To participate in the discussion, please go here. Do not remove this tag until the discussion is closed. Reason for the discussion:
--JN466 10:00, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
Not a good idea. The deletion requests are often not decided by community consensus, but by copyright, and thus give a false impression of how they're dealt with. I also see no problem in the current name. You open a DR because you want a file/another page to be deleted. As with other requests as well, it doesn't get deleted if there's a good reason not to do so. Furthermore, such drama won't suddenly stop if the page has another name. --The Evil IP address (talk) 10:04, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
I basically agree. --GaAs11671 10:08, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
Okay. --JN466 10:19, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

April 18

The village pump is too heavy

Leave alone scripts and css, the html is 592 Kilobytes. This is too heavy. Teofilo (talk) 08:17, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

It happens, nothing to be especially concerned about. Right now, it is primarily due to the significant discussion surrounding the new interface push. Once those discussions start closing down, VP will return to a more normal size. I see no reason for proactive measures to be taken. — Huntster (t @ c) 08:29, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
If one day you need some help I hope people will tell you "nothing to be concerned about". See also MediaWiki:Longpagewarning : Caution: This page is $1 kilobytes long. Some older browsers may have trouble editing pages longer than 32 kilobytes. Teofilo (talk) 09:21, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
Eh? You mentioned nothing about needing help in your first post. It sounded more like a request to speedy-archive some discussions here to bring the size down. Do you fall into that category of using an older browser that doesn't cope well with pages longer than 32 kilobytes? Sorry to say, but it's not uncommon for these types of discussion pages to fall over that number. See WP:ANI over at en.wiki for a never-ending offender. — Huntster (t @ c) 09:26, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
At least it isn't 4 tonnes like this pump! Bidgee (talk) 13:56, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
As it only draws partially on fresh water, isn't more like this this? BTW, we could switch the image based on the pagesize (sample here. That might not make it load faster though. -- User:Docu at 06:08, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
I sympathise with Teofilo, it takes my fast internet connection 19 seconds to load the 2.3 megabyte page, so I tried to reduce the network load for users: replaced embedded GIFs with links - saving 1.5 megabytes, leaving 400 kilobytes. HTML load is "only" 154 kilobytes, while CSS and XHR are small. Javascript is 172 kilobytes, but I do use a few gadgets and custom JS. -84user (talk) 14:02, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
In order to deal with these issues, you might want to use SpBot's services. --The Evil IP address (talk) 12:10, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
The Vector discussion initially should've been created on a separate page and then just link it here. But oh well. mahanga (talk) 03:40, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

Sort order of Asian names

In this discussion it was pointed out that some Asian names should use "name1 name2 name3" sort order instead of traditional western "name3, name1 name2" sort order. As a result the process of adding DEFAULTSORT to thousands of sub-categories of category:People by name was vetted by hand (mostly by user:Havang(nl)). We are left with 150 categories with Asian sounding names on User:Jarekt/a page and no idea how to sort them. Anybody familiar with proper sorting rules for different cultures please help out. --Jarekt (talk) 14:13, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Information on handling Burmese names can be found here. Kaldari (talk) 18:39, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
I've corrected the existing Burmese categories. Kaldari (talk) 18:58, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
What about U Nu? — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 07:03, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
I tend to copy that from the en:wikipedia. It seems better to be wrong in the same way as the en:wiki than to have nothing. It might be a good idea to regenerate the list as several of them might be corrected by now. --Foroa (talk) 15:26, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

Wrong way

Resolved

Could somebody delet those uploads?

[26] [27]

My mistake I uploaded the wrong ones from my computer. MachoCarioca (talk) 22:15, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

✓ Done. No problem. Maybe try asking on COM:AN next time, though. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 22:25, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

April 20

A demonstration of how descriptive tagging might start

Rather than append one of the other threads on the matter of explicit images here on commons, I thought I'd drop a new note in :-)

If you feel that the idea of some sort of media categorisation (a la flickr) might be useful and sensible both for us, and downstream users like schools etc. then head on over to Wikiproject:Erotica for a demonstration and sandbox area. I've created a template, which includes a 'hidden category' - currently both called 'Filterdemo' - which may help in this effort, I've also created a discussion and editing space to focus this matter in one spot, hopefully best designed to ensure progress. It's early days with this demo work, so all feedback is appreciated :-) best, Privatemusings (talk) 01:20, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

Don't pollute images or categories with your templates. If you really want to censor, build it on top of Commons so that only the people who want it can enable it. Chinese government doesn't need to edit the content to filter out offensive content, so why should you do that? Multichill (talk) 03:23, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
Per loads of prior discussion, neither Commons nor the English Wikipedia should contain a classification of content (hidden or otherwise) based on a subjective impression of obscenity. However, it's totally okay to have categories like Category:Penis, which may be useful for building the filtering software you imagine. Dcoetzee (talk) 06:11, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
Subjective, yes. And culture-dependant. --GaAs11671 07:12, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
Subjective, culture-dependent, and incredibly blunt. At Commons talk:Wikiproject:Erotica/image level demo I've made a gallery of 12 images, ranging from a photograph of sexual intercourse to the atomic structure of a chemical to a photograph of a church. All of these images are in Category:Sex or a subcategory of it, and if one wants to filter any image tagged as "filter desirable for some" then the only option is to filter all of them. Thryduulf (talk) 10:02, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
Multichill hits it right here. We shouldn't give people the impression that "offensive" images are something bad. If one wants to filter categories, then of course there will be false positives, just take a look at some of those images categorized by a bot. In such a case, a better filter should be built. Google Streetview is also able to blur out faces, so I'm sure it should probably be possible to do similar with this kind of images. --The Evil IP address (talk) 14:54, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

where are the images from the German federal archive gone??

Hello everybody,

I am a german model builder, mainly building models of the time of world war II

In one of our forums, the following link was pubslished:

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Images_from_the_German_Federal_Archive_by_year

I and many of my colleagues where very happy to find such a huge source of great pictures from our past for detailed research about materials, units and so on.

Of course we do NOT glorify these "dark" years, we see us just as Interested in the techniques and materials of these days, the history of the units and we´re trying to create our "own" Picture or better "Diorama" of snapshots like they could have happened then.

Sinee Oct, 23rd 2009 the page is closed /under construction and we all ask us, where the pics have gone.

I tried to find them in the pages of the federal archive, but the research is a lot more complicated than here.

I hope someone can help me (us)

Category:Germany by decade is probably a good place to start in. Multichill (talk) 19:39, 15 April 2010 (UTC)
...and probably Category:Germany in the 1930s and Category:Germany in the 1940s in particular. Also, we have a Category:World War II. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 20:01, 15 April 2010 (UTC)
This should be a FAQ. See Commons:Village_pump#Bundesarchiv_categorization --Jarekt (talk) 20:38, 15 April 2010 (UTC)
Did anyone object to the following proposal? It seemed to have support, but was reverted by Martin H. as not having enough consensus:
  1. Revert Multichill's edit to the template so that all of the Bundesarchiv images are auto-assigned to categories like "Category:Images from the German Federal Archive, year 1943". Make all of these categories hidden. This way you can use the categories to find things within the collection, but it won't intrude on the "official" categorization.
  2. Run a bot to manually assign year categories to all the Bundesarchiv images, so that each image belongs to a category like "Category:1943 in Germany".
Wouldn't this solution address everyone's concerns? Kaldari (talk) 23:26, 15 April 2010 (UTC)
 Support This what I tried but was reverted--Jarekt (talk) 23:49, 15 April 2010 (UTC)
 Support Of course. Trycatch (talk) 15:17, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
Why step 1? You can do step 2 without step one. When do you plan on removing the hack? 1 month? 1 year? If we set a fixed date it's fine with me. Multichill (talk) 23:35, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
 Oppose 1 &  Support 2 : building models of the time of world war II can be done with pictures from other collections too. Use Category:Germany by decade is a good answer to the question. Teofilo (talk) 08:00, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
Category:Germany by decade is not a good answer to that question. For example out of 956 images one finds by intersecting Category:1941 with Category:Images from the German Federal Archive, Category:1941 in Germany has only 162. About 500 images can be found in Category:1941 in Poland, but the rest is hard to find. And that is only for images which were actualy categorized into "by year" categories (directly or indirectly), large number were not (here, here or here}. At the moment There is truly no good way to find by pictures of German Army at some specific point in time. --Jarekt (talk) 04:10, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
 Oppose 1 &  Support 2 - Never mix sources with categorization topics. --Foroa (talk) 15:28, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
I think the proposal is to group them by date, not by topic. -- User:Docu at 15:37, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
I think we all support proposition #2, but so far most work on #2 was done based on directory structure from #1, and to my knowledge all the date based classification work stopped when "by year" categories were removed. However since "by year" categories seem to be still unpopular I thin I might be able to create and work with "By year" galleries like Images from the German Federal Archive from 19xx. AutoWikiBrowser allows intersecting files based on their galleries so most tasks one can do with categories one will be able to do with Galleries. --Jarekt (talk) 16:04, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
"Never mix sources with categorization topics." I keep hearing this rule over and over again here. Where does it come from? Our categorization system is not a tagging system. We can make our categories as granular as needed for practical purposes. Sometimes that means mixing authors and media, sometimes it means mixing events with years, sometimes it means mixing country with professions, sometimes it means mixing sources with topics. As Commons:Categories explains: "under-categorization can actually be a cause of over-categorization". Where do you guys get your categorizing rules from? Kaldari (talk) 19:55, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

April 16

Wikisource WikiProject Popular Science Monthly

I have reported some problems about a Wikisource-related mass upload. Please add your comments at s:Wikisource talk:WikiProject Popular Science Monthly#File names and file descriptions on Wikimedia Commons. Teofilo (talk) 09:35, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

Hi Teofilo. I am the editor who devised the naming convention and uploaded the images to the commons. The issue of image naming was well considered in the context of the PSM project, and the solution to your problem is simply assigning a #redirect with the desired name. There are an estimated 15,000 images in the project and very few deserve additional attention other than their appearance in the pages of the publication, since they are of poor quality and there are far better images (often the same) available on the Commons. Poorly named portrait images will be corrected in due time, as newer uploads are better named. The image name indicates the project "TPSM", V = Volume, P = Page, and if there is a figure number, that is also indicated in the name. I hope this helps and if you need any additional info, please don't hesitate to contact me. Ineuw talk page on en.ws 18:16, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
very few deserve additional attention other than their appearance in the pages of the publication Really ? Among 15000 pictures is it not inevitable that it covers some new topics ? On the topic of oyster dredges, File:TPSMV6P22 Fig 6.jpg is not worse than File:Oyster Fishing 1771 c.gif, and it is better to have two pictures rather than only one. I don't know how much you must type by hand, and how much is done automatically by computer, but in case the job is done by a computer, it is not more difficult for a computer to write a long name rather than a short name. So instead of "TPSM", V = Volume, P = Page" you might have used "The Popular Science Monthly Volume 6" in full in the file name, even if my preference would be to use each picture caption as its file name. Long file names don't hurt. In case it is too late to change anything for this specific project, is it possible to have some of my requests taken into account in future wikisource projects involving a great number of pictures ? Teofilo (talk) 11:03, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

Geocoded images at Google Maps

It looks like some (recently uploaded?) geocoded images do not get shown on Google Maps. For example, File:OakPointCenter-5090.jpg and several other images should have links shown here, but are not visible. Has anyone else noticed this problem? — Loadmaster (talk) 16:37, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

There's a bit of replag usually. How long has it been? -mattbuck (Talk) 16:42, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
The example image I gave was uploaded 2010-03-19, and had shown up on Google Maps before today. I only noticed the missing images today. — Loadmaster (talk) 17:08, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
Well, it's working now (2010-04-21). So whatever it was that was wrong must have gotten fixed. — Loadmaster (talk) 17:35, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

April 21

Messing with the classic skin

If I've got my skin set as classic I've got it set as classic. Changing the edit window is not required ans should be revesed.—Preceding unsigned comment added by Geni (talk • contribs) 20:30, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Is that a question?--Pierpao.lo (listening) 15:08, 17 April 2010 (UTC)
It's a complaint, and one that I can fully understand. --The Evil IP address (talk) 15:36, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

File:Shimon Peres - World Economic Forum on the Middle East 2009.jpg

I don't understand why the upload didn't work. Does anyone know how to solve the problem ? --TwoWings * to talk or not to talk... 12:21, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

I tried and got This file contains HTML or script code that may be erroneously interpreted by a web browser. -mattbuck (Talk) 13:12, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
I got the same error. File:World Economic Forum Summit on the Global Agenda 2008.jpg has the same problem. I have uploaded a smaller version of File:Shimon Peres - World Economic Forum on the Middle East 2009.jpg. I have also opened bugzilla:23270 but I am pretty sure this has been reported before. -84user (talk) 13:42, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
There is a report of this problem from 2005: Wikipedia:Wikipedia:Help_desk/Archive_33#Can't upload SVG file. However, I remember reading a bugzilla thread on a very similar problem related to the server finding a special pattern in the first 1024 bytes of an uploaded image and then reporting a false positive (i.e. there is nothing wrong with the image, only the detector logic is not 100% perfect). -84user (talk) 13:53, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
bugzilla:16583 is similar but the described symptoms do not match bugzilla:23270. The 16583 bug appears to have arisen when "the first 1024 bytes of the file contained "<?" followed by one of four possible bytes (' ', '\n', '\t' or '=')." But the Shimon Peres image at [28] is different as it has the first "<?" at byte position 16401: <?xpacket begin="" id= (inside the "" are three unprintable characters: octal 357 octal 273 octal 277). So far all I can determine is that this smaller 1,024×657 image uploads Ok, and the original size image uploads Ok only when I remove all the markers from the file (see [29]), but that means all the EXIF and IPTC information is lost. I also tried removing only the RDF markup but that was not enough for wikimedia. -84user (talk) 14:54, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
The image acutally containes html in the EXIF, see http://www.flickr.com/photos/worldeconomicforum/3538858190/meta/ (<a href="http://www.weforum.org">World Economic Forum</a> and so on). If I have this problem with flickr files I rewrite the EXIF to something similar without using html. --Martin H. (talk) 15:02, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
I rewrote the EXIF as you suggested and the upload worked! Together with the EXIF and IPTC information mostly intact. -84user (talk) 15:18, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
Well-done everyone. Thanks. --TwoWings * to talk or not to talk... 07:52, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

Authority data (PND, LCCN, VIAF etc.)

German Wikipedia and Wikiksource have succesfully launched several projects to include authority data, especially person identifiers, to Wikipedia articles, mainly the German PND (Personennamensdatei), but also LCCN by the Library of Congress and the international VIAF. The system can be expanded to include any number of other national or international data.

Unfortunately, there is no system for authority data on the Commons yet. I suggest to copy de.wikipedia's format. For more information about what this is all about, and the possible benefits for Commons visibility, see Template talk:Authority data.

The template would (in my first, raw implementation) look like that:

On individual galleries or categories, the data could be shown as in de.wikipedia (i. e.: at the very end of the page before the categories, see for example w:de:Richard_Hakluyt). For that, I think something in the skin needs to be adjusted (a class "Normdaten"). If that is not what the community wants, the template could even be made invisible, with the data still available for automatic parsing.

I only used the three pages quoted above for a first test. Everything, including the template names can, of course, still be changed.

A known weak point is that the great „Personensuche“ on the toolserver is only available in German lanugage right now, but I am sure this can be fixed within minutes.

I would like to have your input on the idea. --AndreasPraefcke (talk) 14:27, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

Wasn't the "Personendaten" something made to make things more readable for machines like the microformats. If so, I'd definitely support it, but I just wanted to mention that we at least have already created a big collection of information about artists in the Creator namespace (not sure it's relevant for this idea). --The Evil IP address (talk) 15:06, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
Yes, it's very much about making things readable for machines. I thought about the Creator namespace as well, and the PND may be useful in those Creator boxes as well, but since external links should point to galleries and/or categories, they are probably not of too much use to help with this purpose. --AndreasPraefcke (talk) 20:12, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
I agree that this should be incorporated into creator templates. --Jarekt (talk) 20:39, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
Yes, but that's another question. It's about how Commons users quickly find the information available through authority data links (i. e., a link to the "Personensuche" in every Creator template). That would be great, but it's the other way round. It's no problem at all to incorporate this into the Creator template, in fact I plan to do so quickly. The other question is: How do we tag our gallery/category pages with the data? Since most pages about persons are not about creators, but about "persons depicted" (say: politicians, scientists, actors), the Creator template does not really help there. We already have a link resolver for PND links (see e. g. http://toolserver.org/~apper/pd/person/pnd-redirect/commons/11876439X ) but to make it work for persons _not_ on de.wikipedia, we need to tag these pages here on the Commons. --AndreasPraefcke (talk) 08:01, 22 April 2010 (UTC)
You could try to adapt this script for fetching object coordinates for categories through interwiki's to get authority data from iw to de_wiki. This way, you wont have to edit all pages. -- User:Docu at 20:46, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
Looks interesting, but frankly I don't understand well enough how this works. A gadget that automatically fetches the authority data from de.wiki every time the category page is viewed? Anyway, this would only work for people with articles existing on de.wiki, and that's what we already have (kind of). We need a system for tagging stuff that is not connected with de.wikipedia. The first bot run to copy templates from de.wiki to Commons would mean thousands of edits, that's true, but not at all a number of edits we cannot handle, and it's possible to do that pretty much automatically. --AndreasPraefcke (talk) 08:01, 22 April 2010 (UTC)
Sounds good. Let's do that. I think we should attempt to tag all direct subcategories of Category:People by name. I expanded it recently and I think it has a reasonable coverage.
Personally, I'd rather not see pages like (your above sample) Category:Ladislaus Sunthaym (this version). It gives the impression that Wikipedia has nothing to offer on the person. This can be fixed by adding missing interwikis to WP articles and possibly change the layout of Template:Authority data (make it into a sidebar?) and maybe the way interwikis are displayed.
At some point in the future, you might want to create a new category page with the authority data and interwikis each time you identified one at one of the Wikipedias. -- User:Docu at 08:22, 22 April 2010 (UTC)
Changing the layout to a sidebar is a great idea. I dont' know how to do that, but that seems to me the perfect place for such links, under the interwikis, e. g. --AndreasPraefcke (talk) 09:13, 22 April 2010 (UTC)
Personally, I rather move the iw further up. A bit hard to find where they are now. -- User:Docu at 09:56, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

Frozen catscan?

Is catscan frozen? The replication lags grows since approximately tuesday 5 p.m. (yesterday) and the catscan hasn't changes since.--Havang(nl) (talk) 20:37, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

Probably related to the database problems at the toolserver. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 22:49, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

File:Sun red giant cs.svg

I have uploaded File:Sun red giant cs.svg, but after the upload was completed, no picture appeared, just its decsription. May I ask, what the problem is? Jan.Kamenicek (talk) 20:53, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

Fixed. I can't say exactly what was wrong with your version. I just edited the legend of File:Sun red giant.svg using a simple text editor, and re-uploaded the result. –Tryphon☂ 21:26, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
Thank you very much. Although I do not know, what the problem was, now it is fine, and that is important. Jan.Kamenicek (talk) 21:36, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

April 22

Dutch doll

I wanted to put Category:Dutch dolls into Category:Dolls by country, but I'm sure my English is too poor here.

Does a "dutch doll" is a special type of doll, independantly of where it is made (see the content of the categ), or is it just a doll made in the Netherlands?

Thanks for your help. --GaAs11671 07:50, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

en:Dutch doll redirects to en:Peg wooden doll, and that's what this category is all about. I categorized the category and added a brief description. --AndreasPraefcke (talk) 09:18, 22 April 2010 (UTC)
So I was right to have doubts , thanks. I also saw that Foroa renamed Category:Korean dolls, for which I have the same question. --GaAs11671 10:03, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

Bugzilla

I have now filed a request on bugzilla to enable this extension: https://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=23258 -- Daniel Kinzler (WMDE) (talk) 11:05, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

You wrote "and then disable it" =) Should be enable...--Diaa abdelmoneim (talk) 12:13, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
ugh, you are right, of course. Silly me. -- Daniel Kinzler (WMDE) (talk) 21:22, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

distinguishing between images of physical paintings and the painting content itself

It would be useful to add descriptive categories to paintings that indicate whether any border or environmental content is included in the image. What would be the best names for these categories? Could we make a standard policy that instructs use of such tags?

Here are at least four types of images that one might like to distinguish, from Category:Paintings by Claude Monet:

  1. Content only (all border and environment cropped away). I believe the appropriate term is "Full-bleed".
  2. Some border included, but no physical context (e.g. border included in the canvas is OK, but no three-dimensional objects)
  3. Image recognizable as a physical instance of a painting (e.g. a physical frame or portions of the surrounding wall are visible)
  4. Paintings with significant environmental context

Being able to separate type (1) from the others would be especially useful. Here are my respective category proposals:

  1. Full-bleed Images of Paintings
  2. Paintings with Borders
  3. Physical Instances of Paintings
  4. Paintings in Context

Additionally, Category:Details_of_paintings kind of fits in as type (0) in this hierarchy.

--Kostmo (talk) 20:51, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

If you are looking for more samples, you might want to have a look at this category. -- User:Docu at 21:00, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
Question: Why would it be useful? The benefit is not obvious to me. Anyway, I'd suggest only categorizing the hierarchies 2, 3 and 4, since my guess is that 99% of all painting files are of the type 1. (And of type 2, 3 images and most type 4 images, there should always be a cropped type 1 version anyway). --AndreasPraefcke (talk) 08:05, 22 April 2010 (UTC)
I tend to agree with AndreasPraefcke. I'd probably group 2 and 3 together. Maybe "Photographs with paintings" could work for 4.
Recently I added a few related categories to Template:Painting. -- User:Docu at 08:28, 22 April 2010 (UTC)
I would suggest leaving out 1 (as it is the default), grouping 2 and 3 as Paintings with borders or frames (or something similar), and keeping 4 as Paintings in context. I think this idea is long overdue and would completely support its implementation. Kaldari (talk) 16:37, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

Actually I still don't see any practical use (where a frame is to be seen, simply categorize it with "Category:Frames", and that's it). The only real benefit I can see is to be able to distinguish between group 1/2 and group 3/4 in license questions. 1/2 are always PD-art, while 3/4 need another, additional license, for the threedimensional part. Hence, putting 2 and 3 together is not really useful; but why we need 2 in the first place, I don't really see. --AndreasPraefcke (talk) 17:12, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

If you are looking for (1) it helps if you can eliminate (0, 2, 3, 4). If you want to crop images, it helps having a group of 2, 3, and possibly 4 to select from. -- User:Docu at 16:34, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

Cannot load GIF file

It keeps on saying "not MIME type"--Gisling (talk) 19:14, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

Do you mean "upload" a GIF file? If so, check whether it's really a GIF file, or whether the name of the file corresponds with its true type. A GIF file should always begin with the string "GIF87a" or "GIF89a"; if it doesn't, then software won't accept it as a GIF file. AnonMoos (talk) 00:43, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

Page patrol bug

There appears to be a bug in the page patrol implementation. When a new page is deleted before it is patrolled, it remains in the unpatrolled backlog, probably for thirty days, without any obvious means of removing it from the backlog. This is now the case with Pictures by Roulex 45 as you can see here.

Obviously we can simply ignore it, but if there were more than just the one, it might become a nuisance.. . . . Jim . . . . Jameslwoodward (talk • contribs) 10:53, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

Sorry the move and delete were mine but I didn't know the software would snag like it does. I find it both irritating and mortifying, I was hoping that it would go away when the cache got upadated. Its not the best way to do it but I reverted the move, marked it as patrolled before moving it again, it seems to have gone away now.KTo288 (talk) 13:30, 22 April 2010 (UTC)
Hey -- no reason for you to apologize -- if I were in your shoes, I certainly would expect it to be marked "patrolled" in the page patrol log when it was deleted. After all, that's an extra step for the admin actually doing the delete that he/she shouldn't have to pay attention to. . . . . Jim . . . . Jameslwoodward (talk • contribs) 16:09, 22 April 2010 (UTC)
I don't have the bugzilla id in front of me, but I've seen this bug before. If I recall correctly, one just needs to re-create the page (and mark it as patrolled if needed) then delete it properly to get it out of the queue. Killiondude (talk) 05:21, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

Background

Why do certain images have their backgrounds greyed out? It doesn't look good at all. Images like this one http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:M36-GMC-Danbury.0004zx4t.jpg would be much better with their original coloured backgrounds. I notice it happens a lot for tanks. Can anyone explain why? Thank you — Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.250.227.96 (talk • contribs)

Note: I added a section header to make it clear that this was a separate topic. Soap (talk) 23:33, 22 April 2010 (UTC)
You really need to ask the uploaders of such images, but I would assume that it's to more clearly differentiate foreground (the subject matter of the image) from incidental background. AnonMoos (talk) 00:39, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

{{int:license}} vs. {{int:license-header}}

We have here lively discussion about which string should be used in license header. Various bots (including mine) inserted over 3 millions of {{int:license}} headers, but according to The Evil IP address and bugzilla:19966, the {{int:license-header}} header is the one that should be used. At the moment both string are very similar: {{int:license-header}} gives "Licensing" and {{int:license}} gives "Licensing:". So is there a good reason to prefer one version or the other? --Jarekt (talk) 19:16, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

I suggest the one with the link is prefered. Rather than rewriting all the pages though, could {{Int:license-header}} be updated and {{Int:license}} be redirected to it? (PS {{Tl}} doesn't seem to work correctly here...Railwayfan2005 (talk) 20:15, 22 April 2010 (UTC)
MediaWiki:License is intended to be consistent with other labels for input fields which has colons in them in English (and many other languages). MediaWiki:License-header is intended to be consistent with other headers which usually do not have colons in them. In English the colon is the only needed difference, but there may be languages were the messages needs to be more different to be correct. /Ö 20:23, 22 April 2010 (UTC)
None of the two options have colon in English, they both say "Licensing". --Jarekt (talk) 20:28, 22 April 2010 (UTC)
In "standard MediaWiki" the difference is the colon, but the English message here at commons has been customised without a colon (possibly because the message has been incorrectly used in headers). Some other languages also have customised messages without colons on Commons (and French has no colon in default MediaWiki because the message is used in section headers here [30]). But try some languages that has no Commons customisations and you will see license headers that have colons which should not be there (for example in Swedish, Dutch or Norwegian). /Ö 22:07, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

The discussion here goes totaly in the wrong direction. The use of {{int:license}} vs. {{int:license-header}} is not about the layout or the colon it should be about the use itself. {{int:license}} was inserted by many bots to allow localisation of the headers (3 Million times). But the same text-message is used in the upload form. So the initial idea was to change the single other use in the uploadform instead of changing 3 Million File descriptions again! But the Bug request mentioned above was solved by creation {{int:license-header}}. And now {{int:license}} is still used in the upload from and in 3 Million pages, this solution made the hole mess. The further use of {{int:license-header}} would result in the change of 3 Million file descriptions whereas a correct solve of the bug would include only ONE change in the upload form. As long as this is not done, I presented a workaround here, where no new template {{int:license-header}} is needed and the problems resulting from it are solved, too. I also suggest to further discuss the issue there in order not to start different discussions everywhere. --Schlurcher (talk) 07:35, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, we might do it like that, but isn't fixing the real problem. The problems in keeping {{int:license}} are as follows:
  • In some languages, the messages might have different meanings and the heading could then be misleading.
With the workaround different messeges are jused for the upload form and the file descriptions. I dont understand the problem. --Schlurcher (talk) 15:09, 23 April 2010 (UTC)
  • While this might fix the English/German version, it doesn't do so for the other languages. Creating all them is also no solution, because they then are no longer able to update if someone finds out a translation is wrong.
Most of the Messages are not in the standard form any more so creating all messages would not fruther increase the problem. --Schlurcher (talk) 15:09, 23 April 2010 (UTC)
  • The developers might change the message to something that isn't accurate as a section heading, but only for the license label of the upload form.
Not the same messages are used. I dont understand the problem. --Schlurcher (talk) 15:09, 23 April 2010 (UTC)
  • Usage of parser functions in heavily used system messages is discouraged, because it breaks caching.
In hintsight, it would have been better to use a template with the message as its content, instead of the hard message, as developers might at any time rename or even remove a system message and this would then leave stuff like <license> or <filedesc> there. A template could just easily be changed. To fix it now, heavily editing bots should add it to their "cosmetic changes" tool. As we added almost all these headings within less than one year, it shouldn't be too complicated to replace them. I mean, the "easiest" solution for us would be to ask the developers to change {{int:license-header}} to {{int:license}} and rename {{int:license}} to {{int:license-label}} or similar, but I doubt they'll do this because some bots at Commons inserted this wrong message into three million files. --The Evil IP address (talk) 14:58, 23 April 2010 (UTC)
Well then it is even better to keep the status quo and wait until a developer will change the bug correct. --Schlurcher (talk) 15:09, 23 April 2010 (UTC)
I think it is better to ask for creation of {{int:license-label}} and perform renaming described by The Evil IP address than to be asking bots to correct the headers. It is a lot of work and this kind of trivial changes are not popular even in cosmetic mode. --Jarekt (talk) 15:25, 23 April 2010 (UTC)
Ok for me better to stop the use of {{int:license-header}} at the beginning. --Schlurcher (talk) 15:29, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

What means status s4 warning at edit count?

What means status s4 warning at edit count? --Havang(nl) (talk) 19:11, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

I guess that is the status of the replication servers for the m:toolservers in Germany. You find a simular thing in the right corner of User:CommonsDelinker/commands. Status s_nr: OK if less than a couple of seconds replag (replication lag), warning if getting substantial. More help available via "more information" link in status box User:CommonsDelinker/commands. --Foroa (talk) 14:41, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

Blocked in Iran

We (Wikimedia Commons) are now blocked in Iran. See here. Bastique ☎ appelez-moi! 22:00, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

Sadly seems to be blocked nationwide . Mardetanha (talk) 22:11, 22 April 2010 (UTC)
Do we have any idea why? Thryduulf (talk) 23:42, 22 April 2010 (UTC)
Based on the other discussions on this page, I'm guessing salacious content... — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 09:58, 23 April 2010 (UTC)
In other words, no we don't know why. Thryduulf (talk) 14:07, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

April 23

Add category for "Holocaust victims"

I have an image of a person who perished in the Holocaust. No information except the name and date of the photo (1916) and the name of the camp. I can categorize the person under the name of the camp. I suggest also a category for "Holocaust victims" (adults of unknown age) under Category:The Holocaust. I see only categories for Child Holocaust victims and Elder Holocaust victims. Downtowngal (talk) 17:14, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

✓ Done I created Category:Holocaust victims --Jarekt (talk) 17:57, 23 April 2010 (UTC)
Thank you! Downtowngal (talk) 18:06, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

April 24

Original research in an image

I took a look at File:P1000.png, and I have to wonder, is the scaling original research? If not, should there be some sourcing? Woogee (talk) 04:15, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

OR is less of a matter at Commons here than at wikipedia, if you have issues with the files use then it should be raised at the articles its used in, e.g. w:Landkreuzer P. 1000 Ratte. Personally I think that the scale is about right. It was to have used the 280mm naval rifle and a turret based on those used on the German pocket battle ships and battle cruisers, check out File:1963FjellFestningKanon.jpg. You can also google for the P.1000 Ratte images for comparison. KTo288 (talk) 08:43, 23 April 2010 (UTC)
I suppose it is up to uploaders to provide their sources, otherwise their images will be less useful because editors will not be sure whether they are reliable. On the other hand, I have seen deletion reviews where people have nominated images (such as historical maps) for deletion on the basis that they are inaccurate. I don't know whether such applications generally succeed or not. Perhaps someone familiar with deletion reviews can comment on this. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 10:08, 23 April 2010 (UTC)
Some maps are under DRs because of errors, but there are correct replacements. --GaAs11671 13:21, 23 April 2010 (UTC)
Others get nominated because they are seen by one party or another as an attempt to rewrite history, in which case the normal advice is that there is enough room for multiple versions, and which version is used is a debate to be had in the article it is used.KTo288 (talk) 19:48, 23 April 2010 (UTC)


Images can be deleted for being deliberately deceptive malicious hoaxes, but the expression of legitimate competing interpretations is normally allowed, and has been mentioned above, there isn't any "No Original Research" policy as such on Commons. That's why things such as Commons:Deletion requests/File:First second third worlds map.svg etc. are kind of pointless. AnonMoos (talk) 06:07, 24 April 2010 (UTC)

Sí ve y El mosquito sí Pasa sin ver El Elefante

Porque, Cuando sí describen Los Diferentes Rasgos de discrimination rasismo y, en la República Argentina, de no se menciona el mas crasamente vejatorio, ejercido de forma SISTEMÁTICA, Persistente Con Eficacia y demoledora.por Los supuestos llamados vulgarmente victimizados: negros.Quien siendo de piel Clara, el mar asi de origen EUROPEO, asiatico Hasta semita y no ha Sido insultado, vejado y calumniado Hasta, de la forma mas ruina y vejatoria Por Gente this. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 190.178.221.63 (talk • contribs) 24 April 2010 (UTC)

Esto no es un foro de discusión general. Es un lugar para discutir cuestiones relativas a la Wikimedia Commons. Por lo que yo puedo ver o divinir, su pregunta no pertiene de ninguna manera a la Wikimedia Commons. - Jmabel ! talk 04:12, 24 April 2010 (UTC)

No good idea for categories

Here is a Gallery of images of user:Paulshader [31] - he had uploaded several images with a before/after-effect (antes - despues) related to city planning. Unfortunately there are no descriptions and no context. Are these files in scope? (I think he planned an article that was not realized.) And does anyone know appropriate categories? Best wishes Cholo Aleman (talk) 09:46, 24 April 2010 (UTC)

I think you've anwsered your own question, Category:Town planning immediately springs to mind though a little searching gives us the existing cat Category:Urban planning. Since they are before and after pictures,Category:Urban renewal would perhaps be more apt, which could be created as a sub category of urban planning.KTo288 (talk) 11:28, 24 April 2010 (UTC)
I'm also pretty sure now (about 90%) that the files are of a pedestrianisation plan (compare the pairs of before and afters) for the Calle Real in Huancaya. In File:Antes 05.jpg you can see the banner for a restraunt (Chifa Xu Restaurante) for which this weblink can be found, similarly File:Antes 04.jpg is of a pharmacy (Botica BTL) for which this weblink can be found. having a quick google around produces this forum about the pedestrianisation scheme. So I would suggest also adding the categories Category:Pedestrian zones and Category:Huancayo.KTo288 (talk) 12:20, 24 April 2010 (UTC)

Statistics

Is there any Commons site that shows the file upload statistics of Commons users? Who uploaded how much images; how many bytes have been uploaded by some user and so on. --80.187.107.208 17:07, 24 April 2010 (UTC)

Not as far as I know, but a toolserver query should be able to provide that information. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 17:55, 24 April 2010 (UTC)
Enwiki has it at w:WP:DBR#Statistics. I'll bug MZMcBride to see if they can run it for Commons (see COM:DBR#Statistics). Killiondude (talk) 18:36, 24 April 2010 (UTC)

Threshold of originality question

Please see:

Can this file be moved to Commons, as was recommended in that deletion discussion on en.wikipedia? Thank you for your time. -- Cirt (talk) 14:24, 24 April 2010 (UTC)

If it is PD, it can be moved here. If it is not PD, it cannot. I'd argue that it is PD, but I think we should wait for the outcome of the deletion discussion. Regards, -- ChrisiPK (Talk|Contribs) 14:31, 24 April 2010 (UTC)
It would seem to have pass two tests to check against "Works lacking originality", the work around the facts and then the simplicity of the layout. It would seem that the first is a statement of fact, and the layout question would seem to be classified as simple. If there is any case law to compare this to, then maybe that is a reasonable check, however, it would seem to be factual and lacking in originality with regard to its layout. I wouldn't argue if it was moved here.  — billinghurst sDrewth 14:33, 24 April 2010 (UTC)
Okay thank you, that indeed sounds reasonable. -- Cirt (talk) 14:34, 24 April 2010 (UTC)
As I commented there, this is not just an image, but it is an image of some text, and the text would have an author who would own the copyright. If all that was important was originality, then we could go around scanning books and claiming that because there was no originality in the layout of the page the scans would be PD. You have to ask yourself what would be the value of that image if it was just a jumble of random letters that approximated those in the image. Or if the image was so small that the letters were so blurred as to be illegible (and therefore de minimis). Such images would have no value at all and would not be educational. You must therefore admit it is not the image per se that you wish to use but the text, and I suggest that to do so would be a copyvio.KTo288 (talk) 15:48, 24 April 2010 (UTC)
I've seen one site that said that a court ruled a product description, for vaginal deodorant, did not have sufficient creativity to be copyrightable. It was this length, maybe a little longer. Given the factual nature of the text, I can see the argument that the text on the page is not copyrightable. (I know we don't consider this, but I have a hard time imagining a real reuse of this image that wouldn't be fair use, libel, or use of subcopyrightable parts.)--Prosfilaes (talk) 17:05, 24 April 2010 (UTC)
That would presumably come down to the idea-expression divide and the merger doctrine: if there's only one way, or very few ways, of expressing the idea conveyed by the message, then the expression itself cannot be copyrighted. In any case, though, I agree that it's only the text that's at issue: per Compendium II of Copyright Office Practices, section 506.03, "mere variations of typographic ornamentation, lettering, or coloring" are not valid grounds for a copyright claim. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 17:47, 24 April 2010 (UTC)

Cannot see any originality --Histo (talk) 17:46, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

Why isn't this category showing properly?

Was just perusing some old uploads of mine, and stumbled across File:A small shipyard on the Thames - Francis Holman.jpg. Wondered why it wasn't in Category:Francis Holman, as some others I uploaded at the same time are -- open up the edit, and it does have the code for it, but isn't listed on the page. Tried a dummy edit, purging the cache on the category page and on the image page, and nothing I'm doing is seeming to work in getting it to show up. Any thoughts? AllynJ (talk) 20:20, 24 April 2010 (UTC)

Original upload log had open nowiki tag and didn't had closing one --Justass (talk) 20:24, 24 April 2010 (UTC)
Ahhh, that makes perfect sense. Good catch, ta. AllynJ (talk) 21:12, 24 April 2010 (UTC)

April 25

Deletion request

Can some kind admin please delete the original version of File:AcreNE1799.jpg, while leaving the second (current) edition? I uploaded the wrong one and it is much too big (25MB). Thanks. Zero0000 (talk) 15:11, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

If it's below 100MB, we (at least I) would be glad to have it. Would you consider uploading it under another name? -- User:Docu at 15:16, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

Removing images that I've uploaded

I just want to remove some my of images that I've uploaded. Those pics are outdated and are not so good compared to their replacements that are better and up-to-date. Please refer to the table below.

Pics that I want to remove. Their replacements.
Image:Calumpang River.jpg Image:Calumpang River2.jpg
Image:Purok 1 Bilogo Entrance at Maapas-Dagatan Roads.jpg Image:Barangay Bilogo2.JPG
Image:Gov. Feliciano Sanoy Leviste Memorial and Multi-Purpose Gymnasium.JPG Image:Governor Feliciano Sanoy Leviste Memorial and Multi-Purpose Gymnasium.JPG

Is this possible and reasonable? If it is, how do I send it for deletion? Kampfgruppe (talk) 04:26, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

It is possible, but in my opinion not necessary for these images, which are perfectly Ok to keep. What is useful is to add a link to the other views of the same place, as I have done for File:Calumpang River.jpg linking to File:Calumpang River2.jpg. In fact the older images show different views that could have historical interest. -84user (talk) 07:35, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
Thanks for the advise, User:84user. Well in my opinion, you have a point within the "historical interest" of the older images. But I'm convinced to remove them because of it's bad quality, just what User:Jarekt have said. If those files will be removed here, I shall keep them in my system (PC), for the "historical interest". Kampfgruppe (talk) 14:26, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
Can you explain what views of "historical interest" are shown in the first 3 images, but not the last 3? Kaldari (talk) 04:41, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
We usually do not delete old versions, but in this case I agree that the original images are of very low quality and the replacements are much better. I would do a regular deletion requests by author due to very low quality and mention replacement files. --Jarekt (talk) 13:11, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
Agree. If you can remove those three old versions, just alert me on my talk page. Thanks. Kampfgruppe (talk) 14:26, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
Of course it's not that simple. You'll need to file a deletion request, post notices on the affected files and articles, argue for why they are no longer needed, wait a few months, and then do it all again when an admin closes the request as "no superceeded images". Good luck! Kaldari (talk) 19:43, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
Thanks for all. This section is now closed. Kampfgruppe (talk) 13:48, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

Gallery errors

It seems the errors in showing galleries (already reported in this topic on April, 18) are still going on... anybody knows what to do to solve this problem? --Aldoaldoz (talk) 08:24, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

Contact daniel who runs the service. TheDJ (talk) 09:26, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
The public complaints page is meta:User talk:Duesentrieb/Tools , but in most cases of bugs which last more than a few hours, he's probably already aware of the problem... AnonMoos (talk) 14:16, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
Anyway, the four-day backlog that was previously affecting the user uploaded images gallery tool is now resolved... AnonMoos (talk) 13:17, 26 April 2010 (UTC)
Reported a bug affecting the gallery tools to Duesentrieb this morning. The bug was fixed since, Now I got no way of knowing if you are talking of the same bug. Esby (talk) 14:44, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

svg-file not showing

File:Zornotza mapa osm.svg is not showing. Can someone fix it? --Havang(nl) (talk) 10:05, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

I found that you have included a jpg image from your local harddisk. This is the primary reason that your SVG is not showing in Wikimedia. After removing the coding of that jpg the image is finally rendered. But I'm not sure if this is exactly you want. -- Sameboat - 同舟 (talk) 10:40, 25 April 2010 (UTC)
File:Sameboat temp002.svg
It's not my file, so I don't understand what you mean by including an jpg image from my harddisk here. Your image is showing, but thumb is still not showing for me. --Havang(nl) (talk) 18:24, 25 April 2010 (UTC)
  • Read "I found that the uploader have included a jpg image from their local harddisk."
  • You probably need to purge your cache.
--GaAs11671 12:09, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

Antonin scalia

Commons:Deletion requests/File:Antonin Scalia, SCOTUS photo portrait.jpg , sysop remove the old version of the picture, which sysop can email the old version to me ? --Doublewing (talk) 11:49, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

Also here.--Chaser (talk) 15:02, 25 April 2010 (UTC)
I note from "Commons:Deletion requests/File:Antonin Scalia, SCOTUS photo portrait.jpg" that the conclusion of the deletion debate (now closed) was that the image should be deleted as it is not the work of the US Federal Government and has not been properly licensed to the Commons by the copyright holder. However, it appears that the image has not yet been deleted. Can an administrator do so? Or does the deletion review need to be reopened for some reason or another? — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 11:13, 26 April 2010 (UTC)
It has been deleted and uploaded again 7 days later (log). --GaAs11671 12:04, 26 April 2010 (UTC)
It's a different image from the one that was deleted. This one comes from File:Supreme_Court_US_2009.jpg, and as far as I can tell, is properly licensed. –Tryphon☂ 12:08, 26 April 2010 (UTC)
Yes, this has been confirmed by the administrator who closed the deletion request. Perhaps a suitable note explaining this should be placed on the image's talk page. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 13:14, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

File:USS Sable (IX-81).jpg

I've tried to improve this file, but made a mess of it. The original file is much clearer than the others, and the image should be reverted to that one. Can anyone assist please? Mjroots (talk) 14:29, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

I think you did what you intended. It currently displays the 23:58, 2007 December 11 version. Sometimes the thumbnails don't get re-cached, but if you clear your cache you should get the correct full page image or file description pages. In this case, the thumbnails are fine too. -- User:Docu at 14:52, 25 April 2010 (UTC)
And it's been reverted to a higher resolution, but poorer quality version. The whole point of having an image is so that people can see what the ship looked like. In this case less (lower resolution) is more (better visually). Mjroots (talk) 07:50, 26 April 2010 (UTC)
How is the current version (the hi-res version) in any way of poorer quality than the washed out, barely legible lower quality version? I can actually see details on the hi-res version. — Huntster (t @ c) 08:09, 26 April 2010 (UTC)
The higher resolution picture is too dark, whereas the lower resolution picture is clear. Mjroots (talk) 09:14, 26 April 2010 (UTC)
The original is too bright, especially as it loses detail at the stern. If you compare original to current at the same resolution the current one still has a significant advantage in detail. I can see the ship's layout just fine in a thumbnail too, in either version, I can't see any advantage to the bright version personally. The current high-res version can be improved further too by carefully playing with contrast.
Of course, preference between two versions of an image isn't really that relevant. As there are significant differences between the versions, the second version should be uploaded at a different location so the various projects can use the version of their choice.--Nilfanion (talk) 09:44, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

Blocking a name

How do you block a name User Talk:Adrignolsin 08:03, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

Not sure what you mean. If you wish to raise a concern about another user that you cannot resolve yourself, leave a message at "Commons:Administrators' noticeboard/User problems". — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 07:04, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

By year categories reopened

Not knowing that there was a subject on this matter going on here, I opened a discussion about this matter on User talk:J 1982. I think my question has the same background as the Bertil Ohlin-question Ö opened with here on de 13th of March. The discussion changed to historic buildings here, but may be we can go back to the initial question: How small subjects is it reasonable to divide into categories by year? And if we agree that very small categories are wanted, would Ö's solution to overcategorise pictures a good idea? I think it does not need explanation that personally I am not very happy with dividing pictures of all countries by year (unless that year is of special meaning for that country, of course) and if we want to use that at all, I fear that overcategorising is the best solution. Hettie (talk) 18:50, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

No, I don't think that is a more compelling reason for overcategorisation than the ones you usually see, which are also usually along the lines of "what if I'm looking for all instances of Generic Topic X and can't be bothered looking in subcategories?" As for your question of how "small" a subject may be to be suitable for a category of its own, I would say "small (for some definition of small)." In general, sorting man-made structures by year of completion is useful. Sorting photos by the year they're taken may be useful (but what we really should have is the ability to search based on the date field in the information template). —LX (talk, contribs) 08:17, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
By year categories in the meaning Category:Events by year are very usefull, but objects/person by year makes only sense when the main category is very big.--Avron (talk) 09:02, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
"Sorting photos by the year they're taken may be useful." Good. Question then of course is: when is it usefull and when is it not? Avron sais: only when te main category is very big. Would that be an answer on that question? I think so. But is it supported by more users than only me? I have te impression that for instance User:J 1982 would say: "Sorting photos by the year they're taken is always usefull because it gives an impression of changes in the scene". How do we think about this question? Hettie (talk) 08:42, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
Dividing a category into sub-categories is only useful when the original category has become too big to be surveyed. When you create a new category, you have to take into account how many images are likely to fit into that category. For instance, for a big city it might be useful to divide categories by year. For a medium size municipality, maybe dividing by decade is a better idea. For a small village, this kind of categorization is probably not useful at all. --Zejo (talk) 15:11, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
I am under the impression that it would be wiser to stop dividing countries - specially small categories - by year, unless the year is of importance for the picture or the country. I notice though that User:J 1982 did not take part in this discussion. I think it would be rather rude to simply nominate a lot of those categories for deletion now, since many of them were created by him. Therefore I invited him (again) to take part in this discussion. Hettie (talk) 20:50, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
The same categories are created by other people for Germany and the UK about towns, and every little town block, what's the difference. J 1982 (talk) 20:55, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
That kind of argumentation could be used to justify just about anything. Other people may do stupid things, but that doesn't mean you have to do the same. Think for yourself! --Zejo (talk) 21:21, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
Please stop fragmenting categories that are not too large. Very often, "by year" is not particularly sensible. /Pieter Kuiper (talk) 21:10, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
Yes, but are you telling the other peope too to stop doing this, or just me? J 1982 (talk) 21:29, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
The only one doing this I have come across is you, that's why I'm addressing you. --Zejo (talk) 10:32, 22 April 2010 (UTC)
I think there are more people who make these categories. This one is not made by J 1982 (a category which divides even further: by month of the year), nor is this. User:J 1982 does make a lot, though. Hettie (talk) 12:33, 22 April 2010 (UTC)
Would there be any objection if I start nominating some of these small country-categories-by-year for deletion? Hettie (talk) 20:59, 24 April 2010 (UTC)
What I did in category:History of Växjö was to revert by-year categorizations; the empty by-year categories can then be speedily deleted by tagging them with {{speedy|empty category}}. /Pieter Kuiper (talk) 21:13, 24 April 2010 (UTC)
Which on the wikipedia I am more familiar with (the Dutch one) would not be permitted, I think. Emptying a category and then deleting it because it is empty is not the way to do it. But as I understand it can be done here? It would speed things up indeed. Hettie (talk) 10:51, 25 April 2010 (UTC)
Anyway, I do not read any objections. I give it a try. May be the arguments for these kind of categories will show up there. Hettie (talk) 14:58, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

Translation check

Hi, please someone check my translation at Template:BArch-description/en especially for grammatical mistakes and typing errors. See File:Bundesarchiv Bild 170-407, Potsdam, Stadtschloss.jpg for an example image with all parameters in use. --Martin H. (talk) 14:54, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

What are the classes doing in there? Should probably be moved to the /layout template. Multichill (talk) 15:45, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
The previous update of the /layout template and the /de version made the image description look chaotic in English language, my intention was to fix that for the moment. Thanks for your attention anyway. Additionaly the grey box comming from the /layout template is not shown correctly in Internet Explorer but only a black dotted line. So maybe you have an idea to fix that too. --Martin H. (talk) 16:01, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
I think in the past all descriptions coming from Bundesarchiv were inside the yellow box and were not supposed to be altered. Now the descriptions are outside of the box so they are hard to tell from the descriptions entered by the users. It is also getting confusing what can be altered and what can not. For example in this file it might be tempting to correct very misleading German description. Can we put all Bundesarchiv descriptions within clearly marked box? --Jarekt (talk) 20:32, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
 Support suggestion of User:Jarekt it's bad archival practice to mess up the info the files came with, or to make it unclear which annotations are pre- & post- the upload of the file to wmc Lx 121 (talk) 22:27, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

PDF image extraction fails

File:Finlands Allmänna Tidning 1820-01-03.pdf doesn't show any (thumbnail) images. In an offline reader, the same PDF file looks fine. I filed bug 23326 about this. Any clues why this happens? --LA2 (talk) 11:34, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

right-click broken image, "open image in new window".
"Error generating thumbnail

Error creating thumbnail: GPL Ghostscript 8.61: Unrecoverable error, exit code 1 convert: no decode delegate for this image format `/tmp/magick-XXMGRFlI'. convert: missing an image filename `/mnt/thumbs/wikipedia/commons/thumb/1/19/Finlands_Allmänna_Tidning_1820-01-03.pdf/page1-456px-Finlands_Allmänna_Tidning_1820-01-03.pdf.jpg'."

That probably means that the PDF contains an image which the render software doesn't know how to handle. TheDJ (talk) 11:57, 26 April 2010 (UTC)
Probably in page #4, http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/19/Finlands_Allm%C3%A4nna_Tidning_1820-01-03.pdf shows the 3 first and not #4. --GaAs11671 12:29, 26 April 2010 (UTC)
I took the liberty of downloading this .pdf, converting it with pdf2djvu, and uploading it as File:Finlands Allmänna Tidning 1820-01-03.djvu. So far as I can tell the .djvu file is equivalent to the .pdf, but uses only 730 kb rather than 1955 kb - and lacks the error. Would you agree? Mike Serfas (talk) 01:35, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

I made mistakes in a drawing!

Dear Readers,

Momentarily I'm writing an extended article about the Palace-Town House in Tilburg, the Netherlands. For the article, which is still in concept phase, I've uploaded two ground plans for the building which visualises the situation in 1849, right after completion of the construction. After uploading the images, I noticed I made mistakes, though! Is it possible that the uploaded files get deleted by a moderator and that I'll upload the corrected files afterwards or shall my corrected files be added to my gallery? Can someone answer this question please?

It's about these two files:

File:Benedenverdiepingpaleisraadhuistilburg1849.png
File:Bovenverdiepingpaleisraadhuistilburg1849.png

Wobuzowatsj (talk) 12:13, April, 27th 2010 (UTC)

UPDATE I just added 'an other version'. This was relatively easy, but what happened now is that the newest version appears as the 'present version', but when I click at the image to view it in a larger scale, I still get the old version as a result. What have I done wrong? Oh please help me, I don't know what to do anymore! Wobuzowatsj (talk) 13:45, April, 27th 2010 (UTC)
Database lag. Gewoon eventjes wachten op de refresh van de cache. Lycaon (talk) 14:08, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

Translation in English, from my post on the Dutch version of the Village Pump; De Kroeg Wobuzowatsj (talk) 14:04, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

Counting the number of step at the bottom of the 1st one, everything seems OK for me. Have you purged your cache (CTRL-F5). --GaAs11671 14:13, 27 April 2010 (UTC)
Oh my dear... I feel so stupid! When I refreshed my browser, I saw the correct drawings. I was panicking for nothing. Thanks for your answer GaAs! Wobuzowatsj (talk) 14:35, 27 April 2010 (UTC)
You are welcome. Clin --GaAs11671 15:04, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

Global account

Skin "Cologne blue"

Yesterday, i created another account (the one I use now) because I wanted to have access to the {{PD-Finland50}}-license in the upload form when I upload older Finnish picture. This could only be done by setting the default language as Finnish, and I didn't want that on my usual account, Jonund.

Today, I made an edit on enwp, and discovered that I had been logged in to wp as Joonundi. Apparently, I had created a global account and was automatically logged in to the same account on different wikis. Now, I prefer to be Jonund on wp and be automatically logged in as him, and as Joonundi on Commons until I log out. How can that be accomplished? --Joonundi (talk) 15:16, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

I don't know any way to do that automatically. I can suggest one thing: select a different skin for the account you don't want to use, so you will be visually warned you don't use the good account. --GaAs11671 15:29, 27 April 2010 (UTC)
I am never logged in automatically on all projects. If I log in here I am also logged in at Meta but not at Wikipedia, and if I log in to a Wikipedia I am logged in at all Wikipedias but not here. I think this is becaues my browser (Firefox) is set to not accept "third party cookies". /Ö 19:00, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

{{int:}}

Is there a list anywhere of which parameters are supported by the {{int:}} function? Tivedshambo (talk) 18:18, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

All pages in Special:AllMessages should be usable with the int: function. --The Evil IP address (talk) 18:32, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

Proposal for revamp of MOTD

This is a major change, and I think it best if the whole thing is agreed to first, because my experience on Commons has been that it doesn't really take that many people to derail quite a lot of work right at the end of having done it, if clear consensus hasn't been gotten first.

Media of the Day (MOTD), a section of Commons' home page, is a largely unsupportable and broken system at present. The major problems are:

  1. It uses a one-year cycle of templates. So every 10 August, you get the same file, unless someone goes in and replaces it.
  2. If someone does replace it, for every language but English, the description will inevitably be for the old file: There is no way to even see what translations exist for the day, let alone go through them and delete the old descriptions.
  3. There is no translation culture, unlike with POTD.
  4. Copyright infringement is easy to get onto the main page.

My proposal will solve the first three of these, and limit the fourth.

The proposal:

  1. MOTD templates are replaced with copies of the POTD templates.
  2. The monthly setup and translation areas for POTD will now also allow setting up of MOTD at the same time.
  3. The archives for POTD and MOTD will remain separate: This may easily be done using some basic wikicode (basically, comparing the year of the template to {{CURRENTYEAR}} and the month to {{CURRENTMONTH}}, so that the MOTD elements are only shown if the dates are still in the future.

Point 2 is bound to be the most controversial of these, but I think there's no point going forwards without it: Translation work for the main page does not take place anywhere but the POTD setup pages at present. The current MOTD uses a yearly cycle, and even the oldest MOTD has fewer languages than almost any POTD - and POTDs can have much less time for the translation, particularly if they get swapped in late in the cycle to celebrate an anniversary.

I ask for your support in this. I will, of course, make a full set of test pages before fully implementing this, but this will be several days of work, at least, and without community support, that's all wasted. Adam Cuerden (talk) 19:16, 22 April 2010 (UTC)


Well, I think we can consider this proposal fairly successful (and I'm sure there'll be a bit more discussion once everything's ready to go), so I've begun initial work - mainly just copying over what we'll want to use from PotD. I think we should have something fairly workable in about a week. I'll throw up any design decisions to the community at Template talk:New Motd, but I think we'd be wise to keep it simple, then add features slowly. Adam Cuerden (talk) 12:03, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Errors uploading images

I am trying to supply higher resolution images for File:Human_eyesight_two_children_and_ball_normal_vision.jpg and other pictures in the set. I have them as tif files, but when I upload to commons, it says "File extension does not match MIME type."
What's wrong? They certainly are TIF files.
Yakatz (talk) 21:22, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

The software seems not to accept to replace a jpg with a tif --Mbdortmund (talk) 23:56, 26 April 2010 (UTC)
Yakatz, can you link to where those TIFF files are? It's hard to make a determination without being able to examine the files. As Mbdortmund says, you cannot just upload a TIFF file on top of a JPG file, but I can't tell if that's what you were trying to do (or if you were trying to upload the TIFFs to a new filename). — Huntster (t @ c) 00:26, 27 April 2010 (UTC)
In the meantime, I've uploaded these files as JPEGs (I did not overwrite the older black-and-white files, as these differ quite significantly). If you want to upload them as TIFFs, it should work too (although thumbnailing is not active yet); but as Huntster said, it's hard to tell what went wrong without more detailed information. –Tryphon☂ 11:38, 27 April 2010 (UTC)
Sorry for the long delay, I was away for a while. The images I was trying to upload were the ones from the NIH site which you did. My understanding was that in the past they were not available in high res and that is why they were the small b/w pics. Now I can update the article with the new pictures. Yakatz (talk) 16:58, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

April 27

{{IHL Symbol}}

Please see the essay I have written on the limitations of the template {{IHL Symbol}}. I outlined how the different IHL Symbols have very different kind of legal restrictions and how that should be reflected in the image tag(s). Feel free to comment, either on the essay talk page or the template talk page, and to correct and add information about the symbols, and to propose your own solutions. --SaMi ✉ 18:14, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Help needed

Resolved

I just want to create a nice little category, named category:Schmelz, Vienna - but I have forgotten, how it is done.--Robert Schediwy (talk) 18:56, 28 April 2010 (UTC) Schmelz, Vienna

PNGs

https://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=9497

There's been a mostly-complete solution for the PNG resizing issue for two years. It just needs some final work done.

It's time we sent a message to the developers: The situation is ridiculous; it's time to fix this. Adam Cuerden (talk) 21:51, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

That last sentence is the least likely method to get anything implemented. What is it these days with the combative attitude towards our mostly volunteer developer corps ? Have some flying respect for what THEY do. TheDJ (talk) 23:43, 22 April 2010 (UTC)
However, one doesn't have to be "combative" to notice that the developers seem to give all image downsizing/thumbnailing issues a very low priority, even though these can strongly influence the user experience, the amount of bandwidth delivered by Wikimedia servers, and how and whether people choose to upload their images to Commons in certain cases. It's very conspicuous that any issue which can't be solved by simple adjustments to the command-line options to ImageMagick is likely to take years and years to resolve, no matter how important it may be... AnonMoos (talk) 00:18, 23 April 2010 (UTC)
It has nothing to do with priority, and all with "we don't really know how this works". If you want better support, find a developer interested and competent in working on media issues. TheDJ (talk) 03:13, 23 April 2010 (UTC)
If they don't have anybody around who really has the required expertise and sustained interest to solve such problems, then maybe they should consider hiring people temporarily for the specific purpose of doing such jobs, because the current set-up doesn't really seem to work very well in dealing with such problems... AnonMoos (talk) 10:12, 23 April 2010 (UTC)
You can file your request at the Foundation (though I would like to point out that there is Michael Dale for 1 day a week to work on audio/video development and that guillom has recently been hired to work on improving usability for multimedia, those are long term things however). You can also raise money yourself and hire your own developer. That is what was done for the Tiff extension by the german chapter. The thing you don't do is threaten volunteers. TheDJ (talk) 13:35, 23 April 2010 (UTC)
Hi Adam. I'd be happy to work on MediaWiki bugs related to Commons issues like this one. However I'm not an approved developer and I would have to submit patches and hope they would accept them. In this case, the main issue is that the tools are using excessive memory for large PNG files. The solution is to design a tool which subdivides PNGs into tiles and then resizes them independently, reducing the memory requirement. This would not be very hard to do, but there is some coding work involved. I'll take a look at it, and get back to you on your talk page. Remind me if I forget. Dcoetzee (talk) 11:35, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Can .djv files be allowed?

The current list of permitted file types is: "png, gif, jpg, jpeg, xcf, mid, ogg, ogv, svg, djvu, tif, tiff, oga." Although the other two four-letter names allow three-letter synonyms for Windows computers, .djvu does not. In Windows this is slightly annoying because you have to put the file to be uploaded somewhere that you can find it easily from the command prompt, then "mv x.djvu x.djv". It isn't rocket science but to the people born after DOS it is probably rather obscure. I suggest that Wikimedia Commons accept uploads of .djv files, to encourage as many people as possible to convert PDFs to this format. (It may be desirable to name them all .djvu once uploaded, if that's easy to do) Mike Serfas (talk) 22:14, 25 April 2010 (UTC) P.S. Alphabetizing this list wouldn't be a bad idea either.

I don't understand what problem you're trying to solve here. It's been 15 years since Windows 95 came out with long file names, so anyone who needs a three letter extension is a DOS geek. Also, three letter extensions go along with eight letter names, which is not generally a good thing.--Prosfilaes (talk) 13:38, 26 April 2010 (UTC)
The issue is one of accessibility. When I ran pdf2djvu and tried to upload the output, I received an error message that the file was not a permitted file type, because it uses .djv by default when no extension is specified. What's important isn't that many users are able to avoid this error by one means or another, but that a few may become discouraged and give up on the chance to contribute. In any case, I found myself updating a help file at Wikisource and I wanted to gauge whether this policy was open to change before putting in something about how to get around it. Mike Serfas (talk) 01:01, 27 April 2010 (UTC)
Mike makes a valid point. If the program outputs at .djv, users may not know that .djvu is the same. Further, because Windows by default hides the file extension, and iirc doing a simple rename doesn't (again by default) allow you to change the extension, less experienced folk may have no idea what to do. Allowing .djv seems to be an incredibly cheap fix, just as we allow both .jpg and .jpeg. — Huntster (t @ c) 01:16, 27 April 2010 (UTC)
So the issue has nothing to with Windows, it's that pdf2djvu outputs files with .djv.--Prosfilaes (talk) 01:18, 27 April 2010 (UTC)
Yes? So we just throw potential contributors to the wind rather than make a simple fix? — Huntster (t @ c) 01:27, 27 April 2010 (UTC)
It's not really the pdf2djvu program per se. If you look up w:Djvu, you'll see that the article lists two possible extensions (.djvu and .djv). So I think it's fair to assume that participants might encounter the files with either prefix on the Web or as output from other programs as well. Mike Serfas (talk) 01:53, 27 April 2010 (UTC)
I have to agree with Mike here. Just as we accept both .jpg and .jpeg as alternative extensions for JPEG files, these are both official variants on the DejaVu extension. We should accept both. Dcoetzee (talk) 11:29, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

April 26

Deletion of the Malaysian coat of arms.

-I strongly think that the deletion of the Malaysian coat of arms will not make any change in the public viewers whatsoever. I do however think that there isn't any reason for the deletion. I am not exactly sure I understand why there was even talk of deleting it. If there is something inacurate about it, then why don't you just fix the problem? Deleting something from Wikapedia will only make your website seem insecure. I am only a 17 year old student at Douglas High, but I think that I have some pretty strong oppinions about the subject. If I am not even understanding at all what it is that you are doing, then just excuse this disagreement, and I am sorry for wasting your time. BUT... If I understand you correctly, I would like to somehow get more into depth with this discussion. I dont feel as if a person can really get INTO a discussion over a message on the computer. Well, I hope that you take my feedback into consideration. -Ashley Black. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 198.237.17.9 (talk • contribs) 04:08, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Hello, Ashley. Are you referring to the image "File:Coat of arms of Malaysia.svg"? It was nominated for deletion not because there is any inaccuracy in the image, but because the copyright in the image belongs to the Government of Malaysia, and the Government has not given permission for the image to be uploaded to the Wikimedia Commons. Only images that are freely licensed can be uploaded to the Commons. An image is freely licensed if anyone can download the image and use it for any purpose, including making modified versions of the image and using the image for commercial purposes. I hope this makes matters clearer. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 21:10, 28 April 2010 (UTC)
I am not sure which file are you referring to:
The last 2 were deleted without much discussions, but if you "would like to somehow get more into depth with this discussion" I propose you review Commons:Deletion_requests/File:Coat_of_arms_of_Malaysia.svg. Since Wikimedia Commons accept only files free of any copyrights we try to ensure that all our files meet that criteria. It is hard to fix problems with files uploded under improper license. Thanks for your feedback. --Jarekt (talk) 21:13, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Wikimania 2010

Wikimania 2010, this year's global event devoted to Wikimedia projects around the globe, is accepting submissions for presentations, workshops, panels, and tutorials related to the Wikimedia projects or free content topics in general. The conference will be held from July 9-11, 2010 in Gdansk, Poland. For more information, check the official Call for Participation. Cbrown1023 talk 22:14, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Canvassing

I also think that the Commons should have a page on Commons:Canvassing - The English Wikipedia has one here: en:Wikipedia:Canvassing - So one can borrow from that if he or she needs to. WhisperToMe (talk) 22:20, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

See my post above in #Spam. Killiondude (talk) 00:54, 29 April 2010 (UTC)


April 29

How can I contact a certain member on Wikimedia?

Hi, I'd like to contact the member Solkoll who has created many fractals and posted them on this site, in order to ask about a certain image. Is there a way to do this? --Delicieuxz (talk) 02:06, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

You may post a message on his talk page (at User talk:Solkoll) - In addition you can ask him to e-mail you through the address posted on your profile page, if there is an e-mail address link that is enabled. WhisperToMe (talk) 03:53, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

IMF licensing, again

For such an important international organisation, the International Monetary Fund seem strangely determined to obfuscate the licences their images are available under. Back in 2007, a deletion discussion was opened based on the curious phrasing used by the IMF in their image galleries. Clarification was requested through the OTRS system, and the IMF sent an e-mail confirming that the images in sections labelled "These photographs are in the public domain. They are free to use for publication purposes." were indeed public domain. With the problem apparently resolved, nearly 200 images were uploaded from their website to Commons.

However, with the images from the latest annual meeting, they've managed to re-confuse the situation by re-publishing images from their Flickr stream, which are available there under an unusable CC-BY-NC-ND licence, under the "These photographs are in the public domain. They are free to use for publication purposes." tag. So, what are we to do with the images? Are the high-res Flickr versions public domain? Maybe just the lower-resolution versions viewable on that section? Or are they all CC-BY-NC-ND? How about the images from the World Bank shown farther down the page? Anyone have any opinions on what should be done here? GeeJo (t)⁄(c) • 18:08, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

Try leaving a message for them on Flickr. If that is to no avail, looks like you or someone else will have to e-mail them again, as before. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 18:38, 27 April 2010 (UTC)
Since Flickr unfortunately doesn't allow people to release their images to the public domain, we often have problems like this :( Kaldari (talk) 20:44, 27 April 2010 (UTC)
GeeJo, if you are going to e-mail the IMF, perhaps you can suggest that (1) the organization consider entering into an arrangement with the Commons to directly provide it with images (I'm not sure how one would go about arranging this – perhaps someone can comment on this?); and/or (2) the organization confirms by e-mail that all present and future images that it posts on Flickr are released into the public domain despite the CC-BY-2.0 or CC-BY-SA-2.0 licence that is applied to such images, these licences being used only because Flickr does not have a "public domain" licence (and a similar confirmation should be indicated somewhere on the IMF's Flickr page as well). — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 13:04, 28 April 2010 (UTC)
Maybe its their way to express that they want to publish the material under a dual license, the flickr license and public domain license. At least that would explain the wording in the image labels. However it would not work anyway, because you cannot change flickrs license policy by just adding a text-line somewhere. So, I guess, they need to be contacted. -- Trilarion (talk) 15:31, 28 April 2010 (UTC)
I don't see the problem. Per the email we have the required permission. Our responsibility with regard to verification of licenses only goes so far. We can't be copyright watchdogs for everyone that makes errors in their publishing. If they have a problem, they will contact us. TheDJ (talk) 17:15, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Category:Canvas architecture

I have added a new category. There must be a lot of others buildings in the world build with canvas, but I cant remember other examples.Smiley.toerist (talk) 22:55, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

Modern canvas is usually made of cotton, although historically speaking, it was made from hemp. The example Petrus en Pauluskerk in the category Canvas architecture is therefore not right because the thermoplastic fluoropolymer PVDF was used. The example File:Piscine olympique.JPG is not right because for the roof Poly(methyl methacrylate) was used. In the example File:MetroBrussel Erasmus.jpg plastic was used so no canvas.
So I don't know what specifically you want to put in the category. Is there somewhere a wikipedia article that covers the subject of canvas architecture? Wouter (talk) 22:08, 29 April 2010 (UTC)
Following the wiki trail from the most famous/infamous example in the UK, the Millenium Dome, takes you to Tensile structure which gets us to Category:Tensile structures here. I think there might be a need to merge Category:Canvas architecture to the existing category. I think your title is more intuitively understandble, but where possible I advocate harmonisation with article titles at en wiki.KTo288 (talk) 22:37, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

April 28

Nij oansjen

No, sjoch: Ik haw dat nije oansjen net. Ik haw nea wat ynsteld, dat dan soest tinke dat ik de ferstek-ynstelling krije soe. Mar ynstee dêrfan krij ik de ynstelling dy't der wie doe't ik hjir foar it earst foarby kaam. Is dat in flater fan immen of in brek yn it programma? Mar ik kin it al sjen, fansels, at ik noch net oanmeld bin: Ik soe sizze, de ruterkes dy't jilde, lykje út te wêzen, en oarsom. Ik soe ek net witte wêr't dy nuvere twa-kleuring foar nedich is; at it doel wie om de tagonklikens te ferheegjen ta buorket dat efterút. En ek noch: Ik haw no in ruterke foar w:en:. Wat moat ik dêr mei. At it no noch in ruterke wie nei de wiky dy't ik by it yntegrearre oanmelden as thúswiky opjûn hie, dat soe dan fy:w: wêze, dan koe ik my der wat by yntinke, mar wat moat ik mei in ruterke nei in frjemde taal? Tank dat it yn it Frysk koe, Mysha (talk)

Google Translate tells me this message is in Frisian (which it cannot yet translate). Any Frisian speakers out there? — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 09:50, 29 April 2010 (UTC)
I'm Dutch, but I don't speak Frisian. The gist of the above is that he doesn't get the new default skin, when logged in, although he just uses the default settings and hasn't changed anything. Furthermore, my impression is that he isn't too glad about the new stuff (which he does get when not logged in). Finally, when logged in, there is tab to w:en:, which is of little use to him as the "home Wiki". He would like this to be changed to w:fr:. He thanks us for being able to write in Frisian.
May I refer the technical problem, which it seems to be, to a technically-minded user? I trust that a reply can be given in Dutch.;) At any rate, I doubt whether Mysha could insist on an answer in Frisian. Commons seems to be outside the scope of Dutch legislation on the use of Frisian in official settings (Wet van 11 mei 1956, houdende enige regelen betreffende het gebruik van de Friese taal, in het bijzonder in het rechtsverkeer). Besides, the text of his user page, although brief, is in -as fas as I, as a non-native-speaker, can judge- excellent English. Best regards, MartinD (talk) 12:01, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Public speeches

Are audio recordings of public speeches eligible for copyright? Belgrano (talk) 19:50, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Depends on the country. /Pieter Kuiper (talk) 19:51, 29 April 2010 (UTC)
The Berne Convention does not protect such works automatically as they are not in a "fixed form," but many countries have performance rights that cover this type of work. Do we have a Commons page about this? It hasn't come up much. Dcoetzee (talk) 20:01, 29 April 2010 (UTC)
Certainly the recording, which is in a fixed form, is copyrightable, and likely the speech itself is in fixed form, as most people write out the speech first.--Prosfilaes (talk) 23:17, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

DIA Military Art Collection copyright

Does anyone know the copyright status of the DIA Military Art Collection? It may be PD since it is the work of a US gouvernamental agency.Ignacio Icke (talk) 20:06, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

The site specifically mentions that those works of art were created by employees of the DIA ("Agency artists"), so there should be no reason why they wouldn't be {{PD-USGov-Military}} (or alternatively, we could create {{PD-USGov-Military-DIA}}). — Huntster (t @ c) 23:36, 29 April 2010 (UTC)
The Agency commissioned these works of military art, so there are made during the course of an employee's official duties, so PD-US-gov clearly applies. --GaAs11671 12:16, 30 April 2010 (UTC)
Great. I wanted to be sure before uploading them. I created the template and this category: Category:DIA Military Art Collection.Ignacio Icke (talk) 15:29, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

new question

Hello. Its Ashley Black again... I understand the topic much more clear, thank you for explaining it to me, but I still think that it is rediculous. Why would the Malaysian coat of arms be copywrite? How can I discuss the situation to make some difference? I mean , I know that I am only a high school student, and people dont consider what we say, but some of the things that are going on in our world are just unrealistic... I mean, so just because the Malaysian government owns it, that means that they can say that others cant view it?

Im sorry, but that to me is just uncivilized. -Ashley Black

Sometimes the law is an ass, and we have to respect and obey however silly they may seem.KTo288 (talk) 20:35, 29 April 2010 (UTC)
Hi Ashley,
Welcome to Commons the free image album [understatement of the century (-;] everybody can change
, but you have to follow the rules, most important the international Copyright agreements. In general this means (with a few exceptions) that the photographer (or other artist for that matter owns the right to distribute his works of creativity until 70 years after her or is death. You may download and see it, but not move it, just like you're not supposed to pick up a statue from its pedestal and put it in your kitchen. Patio (talk) 20:48, 29 April 2010 (UTC)
The law of copyright protects the creative expression of people's ideas. If, say, I am an artist and have spent time and effort designing and painting a picture, is it fair to me if someone comes along, makes copies of it without my permission, and then sells them for money? There may be other reasons why individuals or institutions (such as governments) do not wish to release copyrighted material owned by them into the public domain. For example, in the case of the Malaysian Government, it may not want people to make use of the image without approval in undesirable contexts.
Commons is a repository (storage area) of images that anyone can use for any purpose. That's why we can only allow images that are either free of copyright (because the copyrights have expired, or the images have been released into the public domain by the copyright owners) or have been licensed under free licences to be uploaded. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 10:28, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Company Logo's

On English Wikipedia is an image of a company logo (see Getronics Company Logo) Is there a rule that prevents them for uploading this to here?
Patio (talk) 20:48, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Yes. The English Wikipedia allows some non-free content under a claim of "fair use". The company logo you linked to is copyrighted, and we don't have permission to release it under the terms of our free licensing. Some logos are so simple that they don't qualify for copyright under US and other countries' law. Logos of those type are allowed on the Commons, where ones with copyrightable elements (such as the one you linked to) are not. -Andrew c (talk) 20:54, 29 April 2010 (UTC)
No Commons allows many logos, and doing so allows in fact all logos. --GaAs11671 22:29, 29 April 2010 (UTC)
Then explain this and this and this etc (need I go on?) -Andrew c (talk) 22:37, 29 April 2010 (UTC)
Please read this: Commons:Image_casebook#Trademarks   ■ MMXX  talk  22:38, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Sting is missing

Our prolific map-maker Sting has disappeared from Commons (and Wikipedia) without a trace. I tried emailing him a few days ago, but no response. Can someone tell him to quit goofing off and come back to make some more maps for us? Thanks! Kaldari (talk) 23:47, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

April 30

Help wanted from users in Greece

On nl:Kredietcrisis I'm writing about the present crisis in Greek public finance. (About halfway down this rather long article.) I understand the Greek government is going to announce an austerity program any day now that is rumoured to be quite severe. I also understand that strikes have been planned, and that there is a significant chance of riots. At this moment the article is rather a lot of text, with lots of numbers, a few tables and a number of graphs about, again, numbers.

So I would like to add some "human interest": what does this mean for people outside the rather crazy world of banks and professional investors?

I would like to ask users in Greece to take pictures showing what this crisis means to the Greek people, to add them to this article.

Please do make sure that you do not endanger yourself: I wouldn't like anybody to get hurt merely for a picture. Best regards, MartinD (talk) 15:24, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

how to prevent spontaneous keyboard setting changes

Hello, how can I prevent spontaneous keyboard setting changes when moving from commons to any wiki and back to commons; how can I prevent langauge changes when moving from commons to any wiki and back to commons? --Havang(nl) (talk) 17:15, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

You can set your interface language in your preferences. Some wiki's override this by setting uselang=<somthing> in their links to Commons. For example if you click a link at nlwp (nl:Amsterdam) to Commons ([32]) you'll get Commons in Dutch. Next click the uselang is gone and you're back at your normal interface language. Multichill (talk) 20:12, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

now I have to log in every time

I've been using 'classic' skin for months, monobook was what I could look at -it was tolerable; this vector is awful, please make it less blue and remove gradients, the colors should be evenly distributed Q/0/k 22:25, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

I hope when you opted out of the Vector skin, you gave feedback... Because we can't really do anything about it. That was in the hands of the Usability group that the WMF pays. Killiondude (talk) 22:30, 30 April 2010 (UTC)
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