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I would like to see this category removed as quickly as possible, but felt it would be too precipitous for me to do it unilaterally with no consensus at all. CFD seems too slow. While I personally wish Ukraine the absolute best outcome, and I despise Putin, this category amounts to taking sides in a war, which Commons should not be doing.
Why? Can the truth in this matter not be tolerated on Wikipedia Commons?-Maybe the world feels better if truths are not mentioned here either? What is the point of what you do? Heartfelt greetings from - --Lupus in Saxonia (talk) 19:38, 1 March 2022 (UTC)
I agree, these kinds of categories are not helpful for organization and are created reflecting recent events rather than memorializing useful information about media on Commons. I'm in support of getting rid of them. aismallard (talk) 21:34, 1 March 2022 (UTC)
Commons is a repository of media. It is not an advocacy organization, not a directory, not an encyclopedia, and not a magazine of opinion. --Animalparty (talk) 07:29, 2 March 2022 (UTC)
@Lupus in Saxonia, while I understand your sentiment und your well-meant intention, this is not the purpose of our category-system, as well summarized by Animalparty. Therefore tagged for speedy deletion. You might consider creating a paragraph/section about this subject in :de/:en Wikipedia article about this terrible war. --Túrelio (talk) 07:41, 2 March 2022 (UTC)
(After edit conflict and possibly redundant now the categories are flagged for speedy deletion) I also support removal. If Commons takes sides in one war, what is to stop another editor causing Commons to take sides in the next war? This will inevitably lead to contentious category trees as the supporters of opposing sides in any conflict turn Commons into an extension of their information war battleground. As stated by others, the remit of Commons is to store files that enable others to present meaningful information, such as news outlets or encyclopedias. Commons must not take on the role of the news outlet or encyclopedia itself. From Hill To Shore (talk) 07:52, 2 March 2022 (UTC)
I support deletion as a bizarre unsourced category. People are just going to make up which belongs in which and I agree, fight on it. Either way, I'm doubtful that a Commons admin will speedy this so I suggest a DR on both. And Commons is very minor is contrast to the various wikis of various languages. -- Ricky81682 (talk) 07:57, 2 March 2022 (UTC)
Data:*.map
These files, creating a map using GeoJson data, have very poor possibilities to add "meta-data". I think it would be nice to have similar functionality as in ordinary "File:*.jpg". What I am missing is the sections from image-objects in commons:
Summary (where it also would be possible to add a legend)
File usage on Commons
File Usage on other projects
It could be shown below the map-window/coding window. I guess this has been discussed, but I cannot find where.--LittleGun (talk) 07:05, 2 March 2022 (UTC)
@MPF: The original source is his personal Instagram account instead of Ukrainian Govt twitter, thus it is not licensed under CC license. Other photos and video may also taken from other website and I think we need to pay attention while uploading them. Thanks. SCP-200012:08, 3 March 2022 (UTC)
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Hello. I just created {{PD-structure}}, intended as a tag for ordinary buildings that are not copyrightable (important for buildings from no -FOP areas like the Philippines). It categorizes files to Category:PD structure. However, I desire to add something that could set the category by country, with the mentioned category as default, without having to change the template itself (similar to {{FoP-Sweden}}'s function), but I cannot do it because it is too technical. Hope someone will be able to do that. JWilz12345(Talk|Contrib's.)06:14, 9 March 2022 (UTC)
There is a large amount of confusion in subcategories of Category:Diving and Category:Underwater diving because the word diving is commonly used for both and as a result there are complicated miscategorizations within these two. How does one go about sorting this out so that they are separated and files can be allocated correctly? · · · Peter (Southwood)(talk): 15:21, 2 March 2022 (UTC)
On English Wikipedia they are disambiguated as "Diving (sport)" and "Underwater diving", which while not ideal, works better than the current system at Commons. I would really like to see something better, but would settle for the same if that is the only reasonable option. · · · Peter (Southwood)(talk): 06:58, 3 March 2022 (UTC)
Yes that would help. It would show up the miscategorisations.
Would one also rename all the subcategories with "diving" in their name which could be ambiguous to show which top category they belong in?, or just ones that have a history of being confusing? · · · Peter (Southwood)(talk): 09:00, 3 March 2022 (UTC)
Someone has removed File:Lakhdar Amar.jpg and others in the category from the Wikidata entry, saying we have no proof that the man in the image matches the man pictured in this image at his football profile (the Wikidata person), to me they are the same man maybe 20 years apart. What do you think? The person at Wikidata is Lakhdar Amar (Q111049016). He has the same shape of his face, the same hairline, and the same name. --RAN (talk) 18:25, 2 March 2022 (UTC)
Seems likely to be the same person. It doesn't seem ever to have been in the relevant category, though. Also, Wikidata should normally only have one photo of a person, occasionally two, almost never more.
Really, though, I'd tend to doubt the "own work" claim by User:Abdrahmane lakhdar who was here only to make a small number of uploads 6 years ago, some of them from photos as far back as 1957. Possible, but unlikely. - Jmabel ! talk22:03, 3 March 2022 (UTC)
When you scan a photo, the derivative copy you create is your "own work", we need to have room for two source entries, one for the original object itself, and one for the newly created derivative copy. Currently the template only accepts one, to the confusion of every new user, and the delight of people looking for a rationale to delete. --RAN (talk) 07:03, 4 March 2022 (UTC)
Unless you consider the "sweat of the brow" principle, which does allow a new copyright claim, which has been upheld in numerous copyright cases. Also, the Bridgeman copyright case is not part of the Berne agreement or URAA agreement, it was a court ruling that is only applicable within the United States. When Wikimedia Commons users in other countries reuse our material they need to be aware that their country may not have a similar ruling and be required to credit the maker of the derivative work, even if it doesn't restart the copyright clock. Australia adopted wording similar to Bridgeman, while the UK rejected the principle, hence our NPG - WMF disagreement which led to a compromise of Commons reducing the size of the NPG images we store. Most countries have not had a ruling and the status of exact derivative works is unclear. --RAN (talk) 19:03, 4 March 2022 (UTC)
There is a wikidata talk page. Wouldn't it be better to have this discussion at that page (maybe not in terms of people being aware of it but for being the best place to keep a record of this discussion)? And I agree with Jmabel but I have no background in wikidata's policy on how they determine what images to include. -- Ricky81682 (talk) 22:17, 3 March 2022 (UTC)
I do not want to add a second image to Wikidata, I had the category linked to Wikidata, and the link was removed, I want to restore it. I just restored the link. --RAN (talk) 07:05, 4 March 2022 (UTC)
Info You open Category:1960s maps of Uganda, remove the last indention, and save it. By doing this, the category reflects the latest edit of the template. It will, by the way, not appear on the history of your edits or the category, because removing the last indention is less than a minor edit. --トトト (talk) 16:04, 3 March 2022 (UTC)
Wow, so quick. Yet, this means I have to touch every category that is affected by the template. Or is it just the second line (the indention?) that leads to this error? --Enyavar (talk) 19:27, 4 March 2022 (UTC)
It might be wise for someone technical reading this to develop a tool that can have similar capabilities as a Wikimedia tool. Maybe it would also be handy to have a centralised page with "tips" for importing images and what tools could be used for them, as we don't seem to have a lot of technical help information pages for topics like this. --Donald Trung 『徵國單』 (No Fake News 💬) (WikiProject Numismatics 💴) (Articles 📚) 07:55, 5 March 2022 (UTC)
I'm having some doubts here: on the one hand, this might well be a federal government photo. I see no evidence against this. But nor do I see evidence for. It has fairly strong evidence of anonymous creation if not, insofar as no documentation appears to exist in the archive dedicated to him. Think the copyright status is safe? Adam Cuerden (talk) 14:20, 4 March 2022 (UTC)
I guess the quandary is, is it 1) an official US photo or 2) An anonymous studio photo made public (published, in copyright legal jargon) when a positive print of the negative was sent to the person sitting for the photographer. I would say that version two is the safest and the proper copyright tag would be PD-US-no notice. --RAN (talk) 22:18, 6 March 2022 (UTC)
What is the difference between wetlands and marshes? If you reply and tell me the answer, thank you for letting me learn something new. - Anynomous — Preceding unsigned comment was added by 172.97.188.96 (talk) 01:40, 7 March 2022 (UTC)
There is still a Commons relevant problem: Category:Marshes says nothing about what the category is about. To categorise something there I should click the iw link to Wikipedia. Oops, Swedish is missing. OK, clicking another language, say English. OK: "A marsh is a wetland that is dominated by herbaceous rather than woody plant species." So is there some more specific category? My image is not a salty marsh, so checking Category:High marsh, which seems to be a category that should be deleted.
OK, adding my image to Marches, hoping there is no more specific category and that Commons uses the same definition as the Wikipedia article I looked at. Now, I missed Category:Flooded grasslands and savannas and Category:Wet meadows– aren't those "dominated by herbaceous plant species"? Should they be subcategories of Marches? I suspect not; I suspect the Wikipedia definition was a bit imprecise. Perhaps a thorough reading of the article in a foreign language would have helped, but that is too much for categorising one image.
If there were a description in Marches, like there is in Category:Moorlands, bogs and swamps – if the above IP question were answered there – we'd have a larger proportion of correctly categorised images (and lesser of wrongly categorised). See alsos in the subtypes would also help.
Then the High marsh. As it's in singular, it is probably created by a novice user. There being just one image, with its name in Dutch and uploaded by the category creator, suggests there is no such thing as "high marsh" in English. The image has a flooded landscape with dead birches, not a march by the Wikipedia definition at least. One should perhaps check the word-by-word translation of "high marsh" to Dutch and get the category and description from there.
An additional problem here is that the Wikipedia articles linked from the category may describe slightly different concepts, as words seldom are perfect synonyms. Even between Sweden and Finland (neighbours with mostly the same soil and vegetation types) the scientific wetland categorisation is totally different (as the base categories use different criteria). If I am using the definition in the Swedish article and somebody else is using the Dutch one, we will end up categorising images differently. Therefore, we want to have a single definition in Commons, where the differences around the world are pointed out. –LPfi (talk) 10:30, 7 March 2022 (UTC)
If you would ask for the difference between totally generic wetland and the geomorphological term marshland/tidal marsh: The marshes _naturally_ emerge from mudflats and were later protected by dikes. Artificially drained (lower than sea level) marshes are called polders.--Mya arenaria (talk) 22:44, 7 March 2022 (UTC)
For individual (sets of) files, I'd use the title from the book itself. If both are there, then use both in the same manner as the book does. If I'd want to use the template in a category for the book, then I'd choose one for the category name and use the other as category redirect, and use both in the title parameter. –LPfi (talk) 10:37, 7 March 2022 (UTC)
The switching off of Wikimapia makes me problems; my method to find geo-location coordinates does not work anymore.
Lacking technical devices that give me locations, I used a simple method: in Wikimapia, I zoomed and centered to the wanted exactness, and got this way the coordinates.
Since Wikimapia stopped I tried other ways but cannot find any. Whether GoogleMaps would make it I do not know, this tool does not work without polluting my equipment with its cookies.
Does anybody know how I can get now the coordinates?
Because of lacking reliability of the Russian Wikimapia: how about an independent Wikipedia substitute for it? -- sarang♥사랑08:42, 13 March 2022 (UTC)
When do copyrights of photos in old scientific articles expire ?
I am currently working on an article on the Namaqua Afrikaner sheep, for which currently no image is available either on flickr or Wikimedia Commons. But I have found an old article (1960) with photos in it (https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1439-0388.1960.tb00132.x). The article was written by someone called Epstein and working at the time at the University of Jerusalem. The Journal in which this study is published is now called Journal of Animal Breeding and Genetics and is based in Germany. If the pictures are still covered by the copyright, do you know to which I should adress my request for downloading these pictures on Wikimedia Common (the journal or the University). I guess the juridiction/laws concerning copyrights are not the same in Israel and Germany.
I'm not at all used to copyrights requests / laws, so any answer will be very much appreciated.
Thanks in advance, --Braveheidi (talk) 13:54, 7 March 2022 (UTC)
PS : I can read German (should someone want to point to an information in German).
Which would mean that to use them you need the copyright owner's permission. I think that's what Braveheidi intended to do. The copyright might be with the photographer or the journal, and I suppose the article author would be the person most likely to know, and if the photograph was taken by them, they might be able to license the photo under a free licence. However, there seems to be a big risk that the work is orphaned, with nobody knowing who owns the copyright. The relevant jurisdictions are those of the first publication of the image and USA (as the servers are there). According to COM:Israel#Durations, copyright for certain works would have a shorter term, but long enough for the URAA to give protection in accordance with US durations (I assume the Israeli URAA date to be 1996), i.e 95 years after first publication. It seems South Africa has a 50 years term for photographs, but 1960+50 would still be after the URAA date. The photograph may of course have been published significantly earlier than the article, but it'd need to be from the 1940s to be old enough. I don't think fair use is relevant for this use of the photo, but I don't know the US fair use requirements. Otherwise that could be an option on some Wikipedias (including af and en, but not nl). –LPfi (talk) 13:06, 8 March 2022 (UTC)
Invitation to Hubs Global Conversation
Hello!
The Movement Strategy and Governance team of the Wikimedia Foundation would like to invite you to the next event about "Regional and Thematic Hubs". The Wikimedia Movement is in the process of understanding what Regional and Thematic Hubs should be. Our workshop in November was a good start (read the report), but we're not finished yet.
Over the last weeks we conducted about 16 interviews with groups working on establishing a Hub in their context (see Hubs Dialogue). These interviews informed a report that will serve as a foundation for discussion on March 12. The report is planned to be published on March 9.
The event will take place on March 12, 13:00 to 16:00 UTC on Zoom. Interpretation will be provided in French, Spanish, Arabic, Russian, and Portuguese. Registration is open, and will close on March 10. Anyone interested in the topic is invited to join us. More information on the event on Meta-wiki.
Who is interested or who would support some kind of effort to contact the Ukrainian government to ask for Wikimedia compatible copyright licenses so that we could host these videos on Commons, and translate subtitles?
As best as I can tell, Facebook is the most official outlet distributing the videos. While there are news outlets and individuals grabbing the videos and redistributing them, other than Facebook I am not seeing another way to access original copies. Also, to watch the videos in Facebook, an account is required. The Ukrainian government websites seem down all the time.
I know it is always complicated to ask for copyright to videos, but I am posting here to check community interest in making a request to the Ukrainian government for Wikimedia compatible licenses to host the videos in Wikimedia Commons. If they are here then we could coordinate subtitle translations. I think everyone is aware that Wikipedia is a major information outlet in war. I am not finding other places to access the original high quality video copies, and I think Wikipedia is a suitable host. New outlets run ads before the videos, usually cut them to be shorter than 7 minutes, dub the audio, create barriers to redistribution, and in general alter the videos and context of them.
If we made a request, ideally we could check the videos in advance for copyright issues beyond government permission. I think there is no music, other images, etc. in them. See Commons:Copyright rules by territory/Ukraine. The request might need to happen through Facebook, but other channels could help. I think the government only posts messages in Ukrainian, and they have no English language outlet. The request would need to be in Ukrainian. I think a short message is fine to see if they bite.
Nataliia is the chair of the board of trustees of the Wikimedia Foundation and she is Ukrainian. She might be able to stand in to support this request, if asked, and if she chooses. Otherwise the request could come from the Wikimedia community.
https://wikimediafoundation.org/profile/nataliia-tymkiv/
@Emojiwiki: The president and his communication team definitely have time and resources to produce and publish daily videos that are difficult to access. This really could be a situation where they have no trustworthy media partner and Wikimedia Commons could fulfill that role. Blue Rasberry (talk)13:01, 2 March 2022 (UTC)
quite a lot of ukrainian gov websites were already ccby before the war, so they are definitely aware of this licensing and how it helps to propel their content. maybe they've just overlooked this for now. perhaps some public figures can relay this message to them more easily. i think https://twitter.com/FedorovMykhailo could be a start. judging from his tweets about starlink, he seems to be in charge of most internet, communication stuff. RZuo (talk) 18:06, 4 March 2022 (UTC)
Hello there, If I would like to ask someone with a copyrighted image they have taken if they could add their image to Wikipedia themselves so it isnt copyrighted what is a page I could link them to on how to do that if they are willing? — Kaleeb18TalkCaleb19:58, 7 March 2022 (UTC)
@Kaleeb18: Adding your copyrighted image to Wikipedia (or to Commons, the site on which you are writing) does not normally change whether it is copyrighted. It typically involves granting a free license that allows derivatives and commercial reuse, but that is not a waiver of copyright. In particular, if I have licensed an image under CC-BY-SA-4.0 and someone reuses it without crediting me, they have violated my copyright.
To address what I think is your intent: typically, if the image in question is already on the web on a page obviously controlled by the copyright-holder, then the easiest thing for the copyright holder to do is to indicate on that page that they grant (for example) a CC-BY-SA-4.0 license. Then you, or anyone, can cite that page as a source and upload the image to Commons.
If for some reason that approach is not feasible, there is also the COM:VRT system, but that takes a lot more work by volunteers and, in my opinion, should be considered a second choice. Someone else may have other views on that, though. - Jmabel ! talk23:05, 7 March 2022 (UTC)
The Universal Code of Conduct (UCoC) provides a baseline of acceptable behavior for the entire movement. The revised enforcement guidelines were published 24 January 2022 as a proposed way to apply the policy across the movement. You can read more about the UCoC project.
You can also comment on Meta-wiki talk pages in any language. You may also contact the team by email: ucocprojectwikimedia.org
Wow! Amazing detective work, you got it. I found more details on him, he was in the US in 1918 working at Underwood and Underwood and had to register for the draft twice, so I found his birthdate. --RAN (talk) 13:41, 9 March 2022 (UTC)
@Oeneis: Sorry about the troubles, I did not expect that the source code display was used this way. Its coding was spread over more than twenty "Created with"-templates, and now it is centralized and at only one position which bears more advantages. But unfortunately usages as at that file do not function any more, sorry. I tried to restore the source code display in the Mauna Loa file, and will try to repair the other ones.
The text on File:Wikipedia-logo-v2-pi.svg says, "विकिपीङिया एका निंमुलेना सद्दकोसो " which translates to "Wikipiria a free dictionary " which is absolutely wrong. Someone please change this to "विकिपीडिया एका निंमुलेना निखिलकोसो " for the (close to) correct translation. Thanks! —CX Zoom (A/अ/অ) (let's talk|contribs) 15:39, 9 March 2022 (UTC)
Should we add the de facto Afghan national flag (read: Taliban flag) to the template? Also is Category:National flag of Afghanistan for the tricolor flag or the Taliban flag? I feel like they should not all be in the same category for obvious reasons. --Trade (talk) 15:56, 9 March 2022 (UTC)
For some reason, Dezoomify isn't working on this, and given my laptop is, honestly, pretty shit for this kind of work and yet the only thing I have, if someone could grab the full-resolution copy for me it'd be helpful. Adam Cuerden (talk) 16:07, 7 March 2022 (UTC)
@Jeff G.: That explains the bug, but given the only browser that works on this laptop is (sigh) Microsoft Edge (the others make it slow down too much), the console editing is a little beyond me because the cookies aren't displaying in the same manner that the bug report mentions. Adam Cuerden (talk) 18:46, 7 March 2022 (UTC)
Hello Lady Wikimedians! I wish you a very happy women's day! Today, we celebrate your political, social, cultural and economic achievements around the world. Cheers! :-) --Haoreima (talk) 08:18, 8 March 2022 (UTC)
What percentage of Commons images are "in use" in the Wiki Universe?
I keep seeing "not in use" as a deletion argument, so what percent of Commons images are actually "in use" in the Wiki Universe? Several years ago I did a computation on images of cats and dogs to find out what the percentage was. Does someone keep that statistic? --RAN (talk) 02:12, 9 March 2022 (UTC)
@Tsungam: I think so, yes. The globalimagelinks table seems to include links from use on commonswiki as well as from other sites. It doesn't include links, though, only usage, so deletion requests aren't included. --bjh21 (talk) 15:45, 9 March 2022 (UTC)
@Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ): I've enhanced the query to ignore files that don't exist on Commons, and after thinking for half an hour it told me that there are 21,020,221 distinct files that actually exist on Commons and are in use elsewhere, or 26%. That's still much more than I expected, but I think my methodology is sound. --bjh21 (talk) 15:48, 9 March 2022 (UTC)
If an image is used in 15 Wikipedia pages, does that count as 1 or as 15 times? And images in Wikidata count as well? Wouter (talk) 16:02, 9 March 2022 (UTC)
A single file used on 15 pages counts 1. That's what the distinct in the query is for. As far as I can see, Wikidata uses count. I'm using the table behind Special:GlobalUsage, so the results should match that. --bjh21 (talk) 16:28, 9 March 2022 (UTC)
@Bjh21: Thanks, I think everyone is surprised. We are probably much lower in the categories for cats and dogs (and probably penis pictures too). I think I can quote "about 25%" when people ask me. Thank you again. You should probably add your methodology and the final number to some place in the Commons: space so it can be referred to by others, Commons:Village_pump archives is not optimal for refinding. You can save a link to your query there too. --RAN (talk) 19:43, 9 March 2022 (UTC)
Did you include uses on user subpages? I have seen a lot of pages à la uploads by new users in August 2018, and new uploads of Somewherestan. If such maintenance pages are counted, the figure doesn't really tell about "use". –LPfi (talk) 02:43, 10 March 2022 (UTC)
In the good old days when Commonist was working all my pics had been automaticly added to a gallery (e.g. 2020) - so all my pics are "used", right? - well no, most aren't ...Sicherlichtalk19:28, 10 March 2022 (UTC)
@LPfi: As mentioned above, I used the same table as Special:GlobalUsage, so if Special:GlobalUsage records a use, I counted it. I think this should include user pages (and user subpages) on Commons, but a lot of uses seem to be missing and I can't quite see a pattern in them. Anyway, I've added some extra conditions to exclude uses on Commons, uses on user pages (including user subpages) and uses on any talk page. The result is annoyingly similar to before: 20,170,397. --bjh21 (talk) 23:15, 10 March 2022 (UTC)
Main page showing yesterday's POTD and MOTD for logged-out users
i found a perculiar problem. when i use chrome and visit main page right now (UTC 1600!), it shows me yesterday's stuff if i'm not logged in. it shows today's stuff if i'm logged-in. when i use firefox, it's correct for both logged in and out.
i'm quite certain i didnt visit the main page on chrome yesterday, so it's probably not my browser's cache.--RZuo (talk) 16:09, 10 March 2022 (UTC)
What software can I use to create interactive graphics using data from Wikidata and Commons Data: files?
Hi all
I'm working with a couple of organisations who are keen to share their data with Wikimedia projects and I'm currently working with them on licensing.
My question is what templates, modules etc can I use to create interactive graphics like these? I know I've seen them before on Wikipedia but can't find any examples to try and reverse engineer.
This is for the US and maybe other countries, if you read the text, it says "This work is in the public domain because it was published in the United States between 1927 and 1963, and although there may or may not have been a copyright notice, the copyright was not renewed. For further explanation, see Commons:Hirtle chart and the copyright renewal logs. Note that it may still be copyrighted in jurisdictions that do not apply the rule of the shorter term for US works (depending on the date of the author's death), such as Canada (50 years p.m.a.), Mainland China (50 years p.m.a., not Hong Kong or Macao), Germany (70 years p.m.a.), Mexico (100 years p.m.a.), Switzerland (70 years p.m.a.), and other countries with individual treaties." I'm from The Netherlands, so here it's copyrighted (70 years p.m.a.). - Richardkiwi (talk) (talk) 13:52, 5 March 2022 (UTC)
"Character copyright protection" covers any details of the character that are not depicted in the public domain works, but only appear in later works still under copyright. This only applies to making new movies or writing new stories using the characters. See the case involving Sherlock Holmes where mannerisms, costuming, and other habits depicted in later copyrighted works cannot be used in new fictional works. Showing stills from a public domain work is 100% proper, and the ones deleted are based on a fundamental misunderstanding of the concept. So, if the WB cartoons were not renewed, showing a still from them is proper and has nothing to do with "character copyright protection. To see if a cartoon was not renewed, check w:List_of_animated_films_in_the_public_domain_in_the_United_States. --RAN (talk) 08:16, 6 March 2022 (UTC)
I have rewritten the section on character copyright that people keep misquoting to make it clearer. --RAN (talk) 03:37, 11 March 2022 (UTC)
Please also create the upper category structures!
Category:September 1985 in rail transport in Munich There is a template 'rail transport in Munich-year' but nothing beyond. The jjjj in rail transport in Bavaria categories dont exist. The problem is that there are no links between the jjjj in rail transport in Germany categories and the year rail transport in Munich. These files become invisible for wikipedians who want to reorganize the year rail categories. A top down method is absolutely essential. In this example I have added an emergency link to 1985 in rail transport in Germany.Smiley.toerist (talk) 10:04, 8 March 2022 (UTC)
How do I contact Wikilegal at the Wikimedia Commons?
I know of this page and most of it seems to relate to the Wikimedia Commons but as far as I can tell there doesn't seem to be a direct way to publicly ask Wikilegal any questions (out of principle I prefer to have these things discussed in the open rather than through sending them an e-mail) as it relates to commonly held notion about copyright. How can I contact them? --Donald Trung 『徵國單』 (No Fake News 💬) (WikiProject Numismatics 💴) (Articles 📚) 12:47, 17 March 2022 (UTC)
It's legal@wikimedia.org . AFAIK, they usually do not openly discuss content, as that might jeopardize the legal status of the MWF in the US. --Túrelio (talk) 12:51, 17 March 2022 (UTC)
Pictures needed to clarify confusing regional speed limits in Belgium
Europeans would expect that general speed limits would be the same for the whole of Belgium, just like they are for every other European country, right? Well, that's wrong. Confusingly, Belgium has moved the responsibility to set speed limits from a national level to the regional district authorities. Following that, Flanders has decided to go on it's own in 2017, as they changed their out-of-town speed limit to 70 km/h.
Flanders used to have a general out-of-town speed limit of 90 km/h, but Flanders is so densely populated and planning has been so messy (from a Dutch perspective), that you are never ever really out of town in many places in Flanders. No wonder that before 2017 the 70 km/h signs were all over the place. After 2017, all these 70 km/h signs were scrapped and only a few roads, in very thinly populated areas of Flanders, got 90 km/h signs as an exception.
Wallonia decided to keep their general out-of-town speed limit at 90 km/h. Flanders had to set up new speed limit information signs at borders at every border crossing, both with the Netherlands and Wallonia. French speaking Wallonia took a French turn and has left a lot of old speed limit information signs for the whole of Belgium in place, especially on the border to Germany.
I have spend too many hours to educate anyone reading German that Belgium now has impossibly complicated speed limit laws, differing by region. I figured we need pictures with that at Wikimedia Commons! I did find the speed limit information sign for the whole of Belgium in both Dutch and French, as well as the new sign for Flanders only, but can someone please help out with a picture of the Wallonia speed limits information sign?
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— Preceding undated comment was added at 10:19, 18 January 2022 (UTC)
This section is resolved and can be archived. If you disagree, replace this template with your comment. --RZuo (talk) 12:38, 20 March 2022 (UTC)
Translation vandalism
For the last week or so, the "Read" button next to "Edit" have been showing "Kenkan" for me, when using British English language. I found on Translation wiki that someone had tried to cleanup the vandalism, but it seems incomplete, as it still lingers. I wasn't able to find any kind of Village pump or appropriate place to ask on Translation wiki, so am trying here, in case someone here knows what needs to be done to fix it. TommyG (talk) 17:34, 13 March 2022 (UTC)
TommyG, the translations were updated back to "View". But it might take some time to show up on wiki. In the meantime, you can request an administrator to create MediaWiki:View-view/en-gb with View as it's content to show the changes immediately. Thanks. Startus (talk) 04:12, 14 March 2022 (UTC)
Thanks, for the explanation. As long as it's actually fixed, I'm happy to just wait it out. Just wanted to double check that a fix would eventually percolate up to us :-) TommyG (talk) 07:20, 14 March 2022 (UTC)
Wiki Loves Folklore 2022 ends tomorrow
International photographic contest Wiki Loves Folklore 2022 ends on 15th March 2022 23:59:59 UTC. This is the last chance of the year to upload images about local folk culture, festival, cuisine, costume, folklore etc on Wikimedia Commons. Watch out our social media handles for regular updates and declaration of Winners.
The writing competition Feminism and Folklore will run till 31st of March 2022 23:59:59 UTC. Write about your local folk tradition, women, folk festivals, folk dances, folk music, folk activities, folk games, folk cuisine, folk wear, folklore, and tradition, including ballads, folktales, fairy tales, legends, traditional song and dance, folk plays, games, seasonal events, calendar customs, folk arts, folk religion, mythology etc. on your local Wikipedia. Check if your local Wikipedia is participating
A special competition called Wiki Loves Falles is organised in Spain and the world during 15th March 2022 till 15th April 2022 to document local folk culture and Falles in Valencia, Spain. Learn more about it on Catalan Wikipedia project page.
Hi, I just noticed that there are now less than 200 admins on Commons. That's a decline, and a low number not seen for a long time. We are severely understaffed, i.e. compared to the English Wikipedia, which is around the same traffic than Commons, but with five times more admins (Also around 80 active admins here against 457 on En WP, rough calculation). We have a huge backlog, and we need more admins. Any idea how to improve that? Thanks, Yann (talk) 17:20, 14 March 2022 (UTC)
Who needs more admins? More specialty rights are needed, including ones whose duties admins barely have time with. Right? --George Ho (talk) 17:46, 14 March 2022 (UTC)
I'd say that it is highly time to revive Alexis Jazz' "General Maintainer" user right proposal, we could actually experiment with our situation to have more user groups rather than blindly adopting the English-language Wikipedia's strategy as a "one-size-fits-all" model. The diffusion of user rights from the admin model would also make it a less prestigious rank for hat collectors that only want to collect user rights to go after it. We could probably create a couple of "admin lite" user rights to make the pressure on the current admins less and to reduce the future need for a minimum numbers of admins to maintain the project. --Donald Trung 『徵國單』 (No Fake News 💬) (WikiProject Numismatics 💴) (Articles 📚) 19:12, 14 March 2022 (UTC)
This section is resolved and can be archived. If you disagree, replace this template with your comment. --RZuo (talk) 12:38, 20 March 2022 (UTC)
Where is this?
This was taken from the rear window of the Bilbao León rail coach. We ended our trip at Guardo. Maybe the time will give some clues.Smiley.toerist (talk) 12:07, 17 March 2022 (UTC)
This section is resolved and can be archived. If you disagree, replace this template with your comment. --RZuo (talk) 12:38, 20 March 2022 (UTC)
Dark mode gadget
English Wikipedia has its own "dark mode" gadget. I think Commons needs the gadget as well. Shall it be similar to enwiki's, or how can the gadget be written specifically for Commons? --George Ho (talk) 04:34, 10 March 2022 (UTC)
Dark mode is a matter of taste and preferences. To shine a light on this discussion, I need to tell you folks that I really hate how Firefox is forcing dark mode upon me since updating my browser to Firefox 96. My advice would be to keep Wikipedia's door wide open for people who prefer to see black letters on white background. Anonymous, 10th of March 2022, 15h44 CET — Preceding unsigned comment was added by 82.173.160.29 (talk) 14:44, 10 March 2022 (UTC)
That the original format is not free is not a problem. What is a problem is that in 2022, after all these years and when there are already all the free bricks to do the job (FFmpeg), the Upload Wizard is still not able to accept all the possible and imaginable formats as input and to ensure itself the conversion to free and modern formats (like AV1). Uploading videos should be as easy as on any other platform. Okki (talk) 01:47, 11 March 2022 (UTC)
See 'File:David P. Bloom.jpg'. [2] I can see no evidence that the uploader is in a position to upload it under any license. The source cited is an EBay listing of a copy of an 1988 'wire press photo' supposedly from 'a closed newspaper'. The (unnamed) newspaper may possibly be closed, but that doesn't mean that nobody owns the copyright, I'd have thought? AndyTheGrump (talk) 02:26, 14 March 2022 (UTC)
Copyright doesn’t end when the business closes for good, much like copyright doesn’t end when a person (creator) dies, only after a set term after death. I think it should be deleted per COM:PCP (though might need to go through DR). Bidgee (talk) 03:00, 14 March 2022 (UTC)
The license is correct, the Associated Press never added the copyright symbol to the copy they distributed to the various news outlets. They rarely did for any of their images, their photographers around the world could generate up to 1,000 images a day, and the expense of copyrighting could never be justified. Even some of their most iconic images that were copyrighted were never renewed. This image is the copy they sent to USA Today using their Laser Photo service, a high resolution fax-like machine. We host over 10,000 news service images. I have removed "glossy Press Photos from a closed newspaper" which is incorrect, it comes from USA Today, which is still active, but someone kept several images that worked at USA Today and sold them on eBay. I buy them from time to time, mostly older ones that are actual photographic prints. --RAN (talk) 13:14, 14 March 2022 (UTC)
But the copyright symbol isn't required for something to have copyright protection, and the lack of such a symbol doesn't mean it doesn't exist. I don't understand that part of the argument here. --ZimZalaBim (talk) 13:00, 15 March 2022 (UTC)
You needed to register a copyright by sending a copy to the copyright office up until 1977, you still had to have a visible copyright symbol up until March 1, 1989, after that everything was automatic, the act of creation generated an automatic copyright, but people still send in copies to the copyright office to certify a date of creation, should there ever be another person claiming authorship. You still see litigation around music creation where there are multiple collaborators and you need documentation of your contributions if you want a portion of the lucrative publication rights. --RAN (talk) 01:19, 16 March 2022 (UTC)
Leadership Development Working Group: Apply to join! (14 March to 10 April 2022)
Thank you to everyone who participated in the feedback period for the Leadership Development Working Group initiative. A summary of the feedback can be found on Meta-wiki. This feedback will be shared with the working group to inform their work. The application period to join the Working Group is now open and will close on April 10, 2022. Please review the information about the working group, share with community members who might be interested, and apply here if you are interested.
I uploaded File:Parla HSL 2022 1.jpg to File:Parla HSL 2022 4.jpg. At this location there are in fact two high speed lines. One in use: Madrid - Sevilla and Madrid - Levant starting from the junction Bifurcación Torrejón de Velasco just beyond. The other tracks are not yet in use and are the tracks of the Chamartin Atocha normal guage tunnel wich have separate tracks up until the Bifurcación Torrejón de Velasco where the tracks continue to the Levant line. See for details in https://www.openrailwaymap.org/. Do we create a separate category for the Chamartin - tunnel - junction Bifurcación Torrejón de Velasco line? It can also be considered a prolongation of the Category:Madrid–Valladolid high-speed rail line. The line will probably be opening in 2022. es:Túneles ferroviarios Atocha-ChamartínSmiley.toerist (talk) 12:14, 11 March 2022 (UTC)
I personally feel that disambiguating in the category name is wise, because if you don't, you'll get a lot of miscategorisation. Perhaps with a "via"? Although if they rejoin for part of the route, it would be better to have subcategories, like "X rail line, Y to Z branch via W" for each option so the jointly used parts have a place to go. If the line's long, subcats are nice anyway. Adam Cuerden (talk) 17:20, 11 March 2022 (UTC)
I suggest Madrid–Chamartin to bifurcation Torrejón de Velasco high-speed rail line, inclusive Madrid railtunnel. The will be practicaly no pictures of the railtunnel.Smiley.toerist (talk) 12:03, 17 March 2022 (UTC)
I saw that Gedit-logo-clean.svg and GNOME Gedit 2018.svg are the same file, but Gedit-logo-clean.svg was overwritten by the new design. The question is how this is handled on Commons. Should the logo image of an application (so eg. gedit logo.svg) always be the latest design one or should designs be uploaded to an extra file and the file use should be exchanged?
I would keep the original logo and upload a new version under a new name. The alternative would be that the file is renamed and the new design is uploaded under the old name. So all previous uses point to the original logo, but the application logo.fileextension is used for the latest design.
A problem with Gedit-logo-clean.svg is that it's original design is not added as svg to category Gedit logo.
Any ideas? --D-Kuru (talk) 14:50, 23 March 2022 (UTC)
For files intended to be updated there is {{Current}} and friends. It should be added immediately when the file is uploaded for the first time. Then users – who hopefully check the file description before they link it – know what to expect. Adding such a template later would cause disruption, as different users would get different expectations. Even with such templates, changing the file in an unexpected way is disruptive; sometimes colour coding of maps has been changed on update, causing captions to be misleading. For such changes, a new filename is still needed. –LPfi (talk) 20:32, 23 March 2022 (UTC)
Thanks for the reply! I switched all WP pages that want to use the current logo to the file for the current logo. I reverted the old file with a note. Again thanks for the answers. --D-Kuru (talk) 13:51, 24 March 2022 (UTC)
This section is resolved and can be archived. If you disagree, replace this template with your comment. --D-Kuru (talk) 13:51, 24 March 2022 (UTC)
Change name of image file?
I have little understanding of how Commons works. Some years ago I uploaded an image to (English) Wikipedia, which was then migrated to Commons by others:
I recently learned I was working from faulty information and so have - this afternoon - changed the description of the image so that it is now correct. However the file name is still incorrect.
In summary, the image is one of the well-known author Alex Comfort (who write the bestseller The Joy of Sex) and not the Austrian Reinhard Spitzy, as the file name suggests.
I would be most grateful if another editor with more expertise could put this right, either by simply changing the file name (which I can't see how to do) or deleting this file and replacing it with one which is correctly titled (as per the body of the description, ie Alex Comfort appearing on After Dark on 1 July 1989.jpg)
@AnOpenMedium: Thank you for the information. I've renamed the file following your request (after getting the filename wrong on my first attempt). Renaming of files is restricted on Commons, so you need to request it following Commons:File renaming. Usually the link to request renaming appears where the link to rename the file would have been. --bjh21 (talk) 17:23, 23 March 2022 (UTC)
Thank you SO much! Really appreciated. Is there any way to clean up the "File history" description, which is now nonsense? AnOpenMedium (talk) 17:25, 23 March 2022 (UTC)
Stamps of Country and Country on stamps categories and their interplay
I believe that we should discuss this with the whole community, I am starting it here because starting it on a talk page on any single category guarantees that nobody will see it.
So, we have categories of stamps published in every country (and sometimes of former countries or other territories), the format of those categories is akin to Category:Stamps of Bulgaria. There is also a hierarchy of categories of different things shown on stamps, and obviously countries can also be displayed on the stamp, and that brings forth another intersection of a stamp and a country; the format of those categories is akin to Category:Bulgaria on stamps.
Now here is the potential conflict that brings me here. I have created the template {{stamps of country}}, which I have been applying to appropriate categories, and that template places Stamps of Country inside the Country on stamps, my argument is that at least the logo of the country, or the country name is displayed on the stamps. This is true for almost every country, with the notable exception of the United Kingdom (UPU has made that exception, since the first stamps was made in Britain). In parallel Kreuz und quer has been doing the opposite, placing Country on stamps inside Stamps of Country (example). I have reverted them a few times, but now I believe that it is possible that we'll begin some sort of revert war, and I would like to avoid that.
Hence, I am looking for some sort of community consensus on this categorisation. ℺ Gone Postal (〠✉ • ✍⏿) 05:36, 10 March 2022 (UTC)
i think it's better to have "Stamps of Country inside the Country on stamps", since i suppose there must have been countries shown on other countries' stamps, assuming Stamps of Country=stamps issued by country, rather than any stamp related to that country.--RZuo (talk) 16:09, 10 March 2022 (UTC)
Because we host files for all languages, here are the other countries I can find, besides the enwiki project, that will be affected by any decision we make:
@Gone Postal I agree that Stamps of Country makes more sense inside Country on stamps. My doing the opposite was simply out of a desire to link the two categories -- due to the vagaries of the English "of," I hadn't thought too much about hierarchy. But the way you and @RZuo describe it is more logical. I'm happy to change over my categorization if that's the consensus. Kreuz und quer (talk) 23:54, 14 March 2022 (UTC)
@Gone Postal: I don't see why Stamps of Country would be placed inside Country on stamps or vice versa. Country on stamps makes me think the country is depicted on the stamp, not just shown as a word. Why would anyone want to sort stamps by the words they include? That doesn't seem like useful categorization. Also, such an arrangement makes the Country on stamps categories mostly just useless containers for Stamps of Country. Nosferattus (talk) 05:29, 19 March 2022 (UTC)
Pew Research Center graphs
The Center provides you with a nonexclusive, non-sublicensable, non-transferable, revocable, worldwide, and royalty-free license to access, copy, reproduce, cite, link, display, download, distribute, broadcast, transmit, publish, modify, create derivatives of, or otherwise exploit the survey datasets (other than American Trends Panel survey datasets, which are governed by their own terms and conditions) made available on this website (“Data”), provided that:
• any reproduction, display, distribution, broadcast, transmission, or publication of the Data is limited to excerpts and may not be reproduced, displayed, distributed, broadcast, transmitted, or published in full or substantially in full;
• all copies and excerpts of the Data display all copyright and other applicable notices to the extent such notices are contained in such Data; and
• you do not use the Data in any manner that implies, suggests, or could otherwise be perceived as attributing a particular policy or lobbying objective or opinion to the Center, or as a Center endorsement of a cause, candidate, issue, party, product, business, organization, religion or viewpoint.[3]
Now, at Category:Pew Research Center, we see a few graphs and tables. I am not good enough in copyright law to understand the text above correctly. So my question isː are those graphs and tables legally uploaded there? If soː let's expand that categoryǃ If notː delete those files ASAPǃ
@Jeff5102: That license doesn't appear compatible with COM:L. "Revocable" is a problem (licenses must be non-revocable), and the limitation on reuse in full also sounds like a problem. It looks like some of the existing media is licensed with a threshold of originality rationale, which does circumvent Pew's attempts to apply a more restrictive license (if it is correct), but could be debated. – BMacZero (🗩) 18:41, 14 March 2022 (UTC)
"The Center provides you with a [...] license to [...] the survey datasets". I cannot find any indication above that the any graphs would be licensed. The first bullet seems to be about the same as the EU dataset protection (although there is an odd wording making it seem you cannot replicate your own work in full). Do datasets have any protection under US law? In what jurisdiction is this Pew research centre? –LPfi (talk) 19:52, 19 March 2022 (UTC)
I assume that if you use the data to create a derivative work, allowed under the licence, a revocation of the licence wouldn't affect that work, only your ability to create a similar work in the future. That is of course problematic for a database used for academic research, as you wouldn't be able to replicate your results with slightly modified methods, to show your results were robust, and neither could other people replicate them once the licence is globally revoked. Problematic, but not too uncommon (in a project I worked for, we paid for datasets to be used during five years, then to be destroyed unless the contract was renewed – and we were not allowed to share the data) – and mostly irrelevant for Commons. –LPfi (talk) 20:02, 19 March 2022 (UTC)
"Wrong License" tags placed on many files from a 2014 Wikipedia Cooperative Project with the State Archive of Posnan (Poland)
Here [4] is an example file tagged with a "wrong license" tag by a recently blocked user. This file is dated in the 17th century and is Public Domain. The file has a "Public Domain" tag already. There are many more files that appear to be appropriately tagged as Public Domain, however these have the same tags by this same User. Should I revert these tags on all these files, which I am willing to do, if that the correct action? Thanks, --Ooligan (talk) 18:31, 15 March 2022 (UTC)
I asked the same question a few months ago, when you see an obviously defective tag, you can remove the tag, including speedy delete tags. However, once nominated for normal deletion, and image has to go through the deletion process. --RAN (talk) 01:25, 16 March 2022 (UTC)
You could also ask the user who inserted the tags about why he did that. He is currently blocked here, but seems to be based at the Polish Wikisource project. --Rosenzweigτ09:40, 16 March 2022 (UTC)
I think this was because the license is not correct. The files are scans of old book and so they are public domain and not just declared CC0 Zero. The correct "license" would be {{PD-scan}}. --GPSLeo (talk) 09:54, 16 March 2022 (UTC)
@GPSLeo - I see that the CC0 Zero license was used on these files from a 2014 cooperative project. Would the PD-scan license apply to Public Domain photos? I changed a few licenses to the PD-Poland. Is that ok or is PD-scan more accurate? Thanks, Ooligan (talk) 00:49, 19 March 2022 (UTC)
I do not know what the copyright rules for scans in Poland where in 2014. In Germany it was not clear that scans of PD material are always public domain. This changed with the EU copyright directive. So maybe using CC0 for those files in 2014 was a good way to make this clear. But now this is not needed anymore. I think using {{PD-scan}} only would be fine, because I am not sure if the Poland the law in the template covers includes the Poland of the 17th century. GPSLeo (talk) 07:59, 19 March 2022 (UTC)
@Rosenzweig - The currently blocked User could have just changed the CC0 license to PD-Poland, PD-scan or another appropriate license on each of the dozens of files they tagged for having a "wrong license." That action would have been more efficient, would have corrected the issue immediately and would not require other Users do the work. That same User could have asked this page or another User for help in determining the correct license on all those files tagged as having the wrong license. I did not know they were still active at Polish Wikisource. I made a few changes, but decided to let them make the remaining file changes after the block has expired. I do want to thank you for encouraging communication. -- Ooligan (talk) 01:27, 19 March 2022 (UTC)
Please comment
I want to nominate a picture for Quality Image status. And it's this:
. But since I am new to such experience, I can't fully digest all the rules and regulations laid out in the policy and guideline pages. In short, could anyone (experienced on this) please comment if it's eligible for it or not? Haoreima (talk) 05:48, 19 March 2022 (UTC)
Hey folks, I'm pleased to announce that the first (beta) version of my new upload tool for macOS, Sunflower, is now available! If you have a Mac, please try it out and let me know what you think :) Just a heads up: Sunflower does require a later version of macOS (12.2 Monterey or newer). -FASTILY06:59, 19 March 2022 (UTC)
This section is resolved and can be archived. If you disagree, replace this template with your comment. RZuo (talk) 20:33, 25 March 2022 (UTC)
Request for Deletion in languages other than English- is there a policy or process?
Is there a policy or process about Request for Deletion's being in languages other than English? I asked the requester to provide a translation, if they can. Is there a translation tool I could use? I would like to comment on the discussion but I do not know the language.[5] Thanks, --Ooligan (talk) 02:42, 18 March 2022 (UTC)
@Ooligan: Slightly to my surprise, the language policy doesn't explicitly cover this, but I'd expect people to write in a language they feel comfortable in, and for readers to translate as necessary. Google Translate isn't perfect, but it's usually good enough to understand discussions on Commons. --bjh21 (talk) 10:51, 18 March 2022 (UTC)
Thank you for checking to see if Commons policy applied to my question. Could you provide a link to this language policy? Thank you, Ooligan (talk) 00:20, 19 March 2022 (UTC)
@Jeff G. Thank you for the translation. Is there a translation tool on any Wikimedia projects? Again, thank you and Bjh21 for your help. Ooligan (talk) 00:26, 19 March 2022 (UTC)
Although you may use any language, if your language is very rare, I'd recommend translating it yourself or asking somebody else (use Category:user xxx, where xxx is the language code) to translate it to some bigger language. I'd also hope people not to use Skolt Sámi for an Indonesian image or Niuean for one from Peru. –LPfi (talk) 19:40, 19 March 2022 (UTC)
The problem is examplified by, for example, this image record; within it three photographers are listed as Author.
Powell used three consecutive photographers on this 1871 expedition; Elias Olcott Beaman, James Fennemore, and John K. Hillers.
Three people cannot take one photograph.
Each of the 827 images in particular has buried in it text the following statement: "Series: Photographs taken by John K. Hillers during the Powell Survey and other Geological Surveys, compiled ca. 1879 - ca. 1900" obviously indicating that the photographer is John K. Hillers.
If someone sufficiently thick and doesnt study the files before using cat-a-lot, they are going to add on false attribution to others than Hilliers.
Solution is for a bot to edit the Author field down to Hillers, by deleting the other two.
What do you mean by "Powell used three consecutive photographers on this 1871 expedition"? Are images by those photographers elsewhere? Can we trust "Photographs taken by John K. Hillers during [...]", or is it possible that the text was put on the records without research on who the actual photographer was? Is it thinkable that the other photographs are mentioned because they might be the real one? Do you have knowledge other than that stated in the file description? –LPfi (talk) 16:19, 12 March 2022 (UTC)
Four photographers were on the expedition; two of them acting as assistants. In practical terms three were consecutively principals. Several diaries were kept, and the expedition mapped. I know, from a distance, that some of the plates had numbers, initials or names scratched on them. Photographs in the various collections have annotated notes made on the backs of them. Each image obviously has a definite location, and presumably can be dated with some degree of accuracy. I can't vouch for the accuracy of whatever record labelling we have. I don’t know if a comprehensive study has been made and by whom. --Broichmore (talk) 13:27, 21 March 2022 (UTC)
I would say that, without (as far as I know) a formal policy, we tend to operate roughly along those lines, with the caveat that because of Commons' nature as a media repository, much larger areas of Commons are the work of single individuals than is typically the case for Wikipedia in any major language. Also, the fact that the COM:Precautionary principle is itself something for which we have consensus often overrides what might otherwise appear to be a consensus about what would be desirable. - Jmabel ! talk22:28, 19 March 2022 (UTC)
Topics within scope for this call include Movement Strategy, Board Governance, Trust and Safety, the Universal Code of Conduct, Community Development, and Human Rights. Come with your questions and feedback, and let's talk! You can also send us your questions in advance.
@Jeff G. and RZuo: There is a tool to do just this that works on all Wikimedia wikis. It's quite flexible and can traverse subcategories or supercategories with a depth limit and total node limit, showing each category only once in the graph. Here's a query equivalent to Jeff's example. Each graph node is a link to its Commons page (note that only category pages are shown). Here's a more interesting one that is bound by the 250 node limit. Each node links to the query for traversing using the tool starting that node. The other rendering mode is more compact, but makes connections harder to follow when there are many nodes.
Caveat: I did notice that in subcategory mode the node limit is reached at a depth of just 2 for many of the categories I tried it with. This causes the tool to automatically limit the depth of the output to 1 (only immediate subcategories), though you can bypass the limit by rendering yourself as the documentation says.
I saw this thread while trying to search Commons for a link to the tool, which I'd seen before but had forgotten the name of. It seems the single mention at Commons:Categories#Tools isn't very search engine optimized, because I ended up locating it through an amusingly convoluted trail of breadcrumbs:
Image searching for an example of output from the tool
Finding an image on a news site
Reverse-image searching to locate that image as originally used on Wikipedia
Visiting that page in the Wayback Machine to finally find a link to Dapete's userpage
It doesn't look like there is much awareness of the tool outside of German Wikipedia. I'm not sure where I saw it on Commons; perhaps it used to be linked on a more conspicuous page, and the link was deleted when it became a 404. In that case, it could be re-added.
I also came across Commons:Kategoriler#Tools (probably copied from an old version of the English page), which has several links to similar, now-defunct tools. Perhaps the authors can be asked to at least publish the sources. Category visualizations also seem to be called catgraphs in existing Commons parlance, referring to the name of the first version of this tool.
Also, I'm unsure if there is a prescribed format for reviving an old thread.
Should users be obligated to archive their talk pages?
I stumbled upon this user's talk page and I noticed that from about 2/3 deep in the page the templates are not expanded anymore. This seriously impedes other users' ability to read the page and assess user's activity. Should the user be told to archive their page? Can others perform the archive instead? What to do? Gikü (talk) 21:46, 22 March 2022 (UTC)
i think it's ok to leave a note to such users telling them that you set up auto archives for them.
I don't go onto Wikimedia Commons often but I am unclear if User names on Wikipedia and Wikimedia are the same thing? Apparently not. How does someone establish a user name on WM Commons? BrucePL (talk) 00:43, 23 March 2022 (UTC)
@BrucePL: For the most part, they are the same, except for some older accounts that were left out of the big merge a decade or so ago. As you can see, your sig shows up fine here. - Jmabel ! talk03:33, 23 March 2022 (UTC)
I think an anonymous user has emptied gallery page Atlas of Ancient Rome. Can someone please revert this page to the one of 12 nov 2021 13:50 by Meno25? (I have only rights to do one step back, not five or six which are needed here). I withdraw the deletion request. --JopkeB (talk) 07:00, 23 March 2022 (UTC)
Done. You can open the history, choose the version you want to revert to, click edit, type in an edit summary and save. That'd do it (and that's what I did). –LPfi (talk) 11:33, 23 March 2022 (UTC)
The ratification voting process for the revised enforcement guidelines of the Universal Code of Conduct (UCoC) came to a close on 21 March 2022. Over 2300 Wikimedians voted across different regions of our movement. Thank you to everyone who participated in this process! The scrutinizing group is now reviewing the vote for accuracy, so please allow up to two weeks for them to finish their work.
The final results from the voting process will be announced here, along with the relevant statistics and a summary of comments as soon as they are available. Please check out the voter information page to learn about the next steps. You can comment on the project talk page on Meta-wiki in any language. You may also contact the UCoC project team by email: ucocprojectwikimedia.org
Hi, I have a question about the metadata in an image. It seems that Commons somehow is able to extract those and add them as clear information on the image page. I have been wondering if this is generally possible for images on the internet. Sometimes I come across an image where I would like to know who the author is or what the copyright situation is. Is there some way to do that? Thanks, --91.34.36.5612:28, 23 March 2022 (UTC)
The information is usually only what the camera (or scanner, imaging software, whatever) adds, so the author is usually missing, and any author filed may just refer to a (former) camera owner.
When I check where a file is used, sometimes I find it linked to an article on Santali WP. But when I follow the link, the page doesn't exist. If I click to create it, it doesn't say that it's been deleted. An example is File:Idioma_azerí.png, which supposedly appears on the page sat:ᱢᱩᱬᱩᱛ:ᱟᱡᱟᱨᱵᱟᱭᱡᱟᱱᱤ ᱯᱟᱹᱨᱥᱤ. If I remove the prefix ᱢᱩᱬᱩᱛ, then I find the article with the file. But this prefix doesn't always appear: sometimes the Commons link takes me to the article. Kwamikagami (talk) 01:48, 22 March 2022 (UTC)
Only on commons, starting this week I no longer can use several characters properly. Among those are brackets and hyphens, when I want to use
*, it turns into ̈
[[ turns into ʽ
]] turns into ʼ
{{ turns into ̣̣̣̻
}} turns into ˌ
: turns into ː (a different hyphen, doesn't work in wikicode)
̃̈~~~~ turns into ̃ or ̴
̩Most other ̯characters behave normal (dollar sign and percent sign are also gone)̤̤ and I found ways to get my desired input, but I hope that there is a preference I can (de)activate that lets me use my̻ ̩k̩e̩y̩b̥o̥ḁr̥d̩ ̩̺p̪r̪o̪p̰̥erly agaḭ̰̬n. This problem persists independent of my input device (tried on three different disconnected computers) and only here on Commons, not in other projects. I didn't consciously change any preferences before that happened, and I am somewhat exasperated by now as I found no way of return yet. --Enyavar (talk) 06:44, 23 March 2022 (UTC)
Preferences --> User profile --> Internationalisation --> Language --> enːEnglisɦ? Been there, done that. If there are "input settings", I must have missed them - where are those? --Enyavar (talk) 07:23, 23 March 2022 (UTC)
Wait, I found them, what an obscure settings menu. So the question remains, how was my input switched to IPA-SIL? What bug (or feature) could have caused that? Thanks MKFI. --Enyavar (talk) 07:38, 23 March 2022 (UTC)
There is a keyboard icon popping up by most input fields (when the field is activated), with a menu including the IPA-SIL. It is easy to click the one by the search box by mistake, as the box is small and thus the icon is near things you may want to click. If you click it by purpose, you get the menu, but by mistake you can activate some entry without noticing. –LPfi (talk) 11:26, 23 March 2022 (UTC)
This is the feature/icon. (The attached image may appear right of the section Can someone please revert Atlas of Ancient Rome?) This is the feature that you probably used to trigger the change of setting. This little icon appers everywhere where you have to input text, however I have only tried this in Commons.VScode fanboy (talk) 14:08, 25 March 2022 (UTC)
This is a stone which marks the limit between French departments, and it is quite old. It may date from the French revolution. Thanks, Yann (talk) 09:34, 25 March 2022 (UTC)
@RZuo: . Yes, my bot is doing this. It is regularly screening all new uploads. I also screen the database dumps, but have last done this like 3 years ago. I could give this another go. What's the intention of the question? --Schlurcher (talk) 19:57, 25 March 2022 (UTC)
@Schlurcher: i saw File:好又多超市 廣州崗頂店 2008.jpg which had "自己拍摄" in the source. i thought your bot didnt recognise this chinese phrase, but then realised it's a 2008 file before your bot started running.
anyway, "自己拍摄" (zh-hans) or "自己拍攝" (zh-hant) should be replaced by {{Own}}. i'm not sure if your bot already recognises it as such. thx!--RZuo (talk) 20:33, 25 March 2022 (UTC)
Done, added "自己拍摄" (zh-hans), "自己拍攝" (zh-hant) was already included. I've also on the agenda to run a full dump search soon. --Schlurcher (talk) 10:29, 27 March 2022 (UTC)
Overcoming SmartFrame
Have we found a way to overcome "SmartFrame", and extract the highest resolution imagery from pages like [6] (the example, like many on that site, is out of copyright, contrary to the interstitial that claims otherwise)? Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits21:17, 25 March 2022 (UTC)
I had never heard of this viewer before. What a nasty little tangle of canvas, tracking cookies, blob URIs, JS, and Adobe syncophantism... No progress so far. Arlo James Barnes05:39, 27 March 2022 (UTC)
Can I get blocked if I consistently nominate deletion requests to photos of buildings or sculptures in countries with freedom of panorama?
In the past, I assumed a new user who is unfamiliar with freedom of panorama, and I nominated a deletion request on a photo of Telus Sky under construction which is located at Canada where there is freedom of panorama.
This was an experiment I did, but in fact, users who are unfamiliar with freedom of panorama may nominate deletion requests on photos of buildings or sculptures in a country where there is freedom of panorama.
It's easy to make this mistake, especially if users live in a country where there is no freedom of panorama and have experienced that photos of buildings or sculptures they've taken are frequently deleted due to lack of freedom of panorama.
Then, Can I get blocked if I consistently nominate deletion requests to photos of buildings or sculptures in countries with freedom of panorama?
If you nominate a few cases where there is a clear reason for retention, then there is nothing wrong. However, it would be expected for you to learn from the deletion discussions. If you continue to make nominations with the exact same issues, a few editors may suggest that you try focusing in a different area of Commons. If you persist in bringing the exact same issue to deletion review against repeated consensus to keep, then I expect sooner or later your behaviour would be raised at the Administrator's noticeboard. At that point, it would depend on how you interact with the Administrators. If you take efforts to learn from your mistakes and make better nominations or agree to focus on another part of Commons, then you probably won't be blocked. If you continue making the same mistake after it is flagged to Administrators then you will probably enter a cycle of temporary blocks and reblocks until you agree to modify your behaviour. Repeated blocks with no sign of improvement would probably end in a permanent block. However, you should have received plenty of warnings long before then. From Hill To Shore (talk) 14:20, 27 March 2022 (UTC)
How to correct data on an upload from the US Library of Congress (with LCCN number)?
Many uploads from the US Library of Congress have incorrect information, such as the spelling of a depicted person's name, and the date. I also sometimes want to expand the description. (I am NOT talking about renaming the file.) For example, I requested and received a rename of the file that is now File:Graphophone LCCN2014719133.jpg. But the description is wrong. Do I have to preserve the original description and date with strikeouts, or can I overwrite them? If I only want to expand the description, do I have to separate it from the LCCN description? Downtowngal (talk) 21:30, 24 March 2022 (UTC)
@Downtowngal: Typically what I do in a case like that is leave their description as is, then use "----" on a line of its own as a separator, then clarify the situation. So in this case you might do something like:
|description={{en|1=Title: Sewing machine
''Abstract/medium:'' 1 negative : glass ; 5 x 7 in. or smaller.
----
Despite the LoC saying "sewing machine", this is actually a graphophone on a sewing machine table.
}}
The LoC actually says [Graphophone, an early dictation machine, in a room] [graphic], no mention about a sewing machine, If I am not mistaken? VScode fanboy (talk) 17:27, 25 March 2022 (UTC)
I don't quite understand your question. I am categorizing, on Commons, images from the Bain news service from the 1920s. It looks like the same set of images that are on Flickr. Lots of errors, especially in the dates, and many incomplete descriptions. Downtowngal (talk) 00:56, 26 March 2022 (UTC)
The project at Flickr is to identify the people in the LOC image and assign a Wikipedia/Wikidata entry to the people in the images and find a more accurate date. At our end here at Commons it means adding a category and adding the image to the Wikidata entry, or creating a new Wikidata entry if the person does not have one. User:Fae transferred the images to Commons. See: this image where the people in a group photo are identified and some of the people are not in Wikidata yet. The LOC releases 50 each Friday to Flickr. Here is an example of creating a wikidata entry whne we do not have one: See: Richmond Temple. --RAN (talk) 06:47, 26 March 2022 (UTC)
I am really confused now. I have never logged into Flickr or categorized an image there. I am finding uncategorized images from the Bain News Service that are already on Commons. Some of these uncategorized images are duplicates of images already categorized on Commons (which may have come from the Flickr project?). And one or both may have incorrect information. What is the optimal workflow here? I think one is needed to avoid duplication of effort and confusion if the files are renamed on Commons. Downtowngal (talk) 15:08, 26 March 2022 (UTC)
You and I are probably the only people working on the project from the Commons end, but there are a half dozen people working on the LOC project at the Flickr end. Each week the LOC releases 50 new images and they are crowdsourcing information about the images and then you and I transfer that information to Wikimedia Commons. There is a more exact date, we are currently in the year 1924 at Flickr. We also transfer the identity of the person from Flickr to Wikimedia Commons by adding a category for that person. If we identify the exact event that image is displaying, we can add in a link to a New York Times article on that exact event. I also add the Flickr Link to Commons. If you change the name here at commons the only to find the image will be the ggbain number, such as: "ggbain.36868". --RAN (talk) 21:55, 26 March 2022 (UTC)
You stated, "they are crowdsourcing information about the images and then you and I transfer that information to Wikimedia Commons." Not true. *I* am not transferring anything. I am working only with the images that are already on Commons. Any research that I do to find the correct name or date affects only the image that is already on Commons, where I a) change the description/date (as in the above discussion) and/or b) leave a note in the changelog or Talk page of that image. Furthermore, I don't understand what Wikidata is as distinct from a category, and I am happy to continue just categorizing (with its concomitant tasks of a) updating the description and b) using the image on Wikipedia), and not using Wikidata at all. Can you please explain to me what I should a) continue or b) stop doing so that I don't duplicate efforts of other categorizers? Downtowngal (talk) 23:48, 26 March 2022 (UTC)
To address the original question: if Library of Congress images and their bot-imported descriptions/metadata have errors, you can change/refine them. No one is under any obligation to preserve incorrect/outdated info, report the correction to the Library of Congress, nor ask permission to modify public domain media or descriptions, although explanatory notes or links to sources that clarify/correct the identification would be appreciated to increase confidence, prevent future confusion, and promote accurate and correct reuse (if a certain image is widely misidentified outside of Wikimedia, an additional note on the file Talk page might be warranted). Commons is not itself a museum or encyclopedia requiring documentation of every previous (mis)identification or the diversity of verifiable opinions about an image. The LOC, its Flickr feed, and Wikimedia Commons are distinct entities, even if some users volunteer for or engage with all 3. Errors are inevitable in any large collection. Museums and archives periodically refine or correct their data, as do Commons curators. It is unrealistic and near impossible to completely harmonize Commons with any of the source repositories, and keep them congruent over time. --Animalparty (talk) 01:28, 27 March 2022 (UTC)
Thank you. What is your opinion about renaming these files on Commons if the existing name is incorrect/misspelled? I mean, rename only the text part; the LCCN and numerals would remain the same, so that the file can remain searchable by the numerals. Downtowngal (talk) 18:04, 27 March 2022 (UTC)
I think the original name should stay in the title and the correction should be made in the description. After all, it is the official name of the image unless it is changed by the LOC. Even when I change the information in the description I may end up changing it again when new information comes forward. As more photos get released there can be more information found in them that relates to older photos. See the group of photos that had no descriptive information and people guessed at, who or what, was pictured, that later was found to be incorrect. --RAN (talk) 20:49, 28 March 2022 (UTC)
Category:Pacific_hurricane_seasons VS Category:Pacific hurricane season track maps
What is the difference of the above categories? Category:Pacific hurricane seasons has two pictures with multiple season tracks (or dotted lines) while Category:Pacific hurricane season track maps contain 136 pictures of single hurricane season tracks captioned "year Pacific hurricane season summary".
I had considered of putting the images in the parent category you suggested upon. No, I am not talking about the difference of Category:Maps_of_Pacific_hurricane_seasons and Category:Pacific hurricane season track maps, maps contain just maps, while track maps and trac categories contains dotted lines that represents the track and a satellite map.
What about this one ?
Finally I would like to welcome you to categorize all of the un-categorized hurricane maps.
The Community Development team at the Wikimedia Foundation is supporting the creation of a global, community-driven Leadership Development Working Group. The purpose of the working group is to advise leadership development work. Feedback was collected in February 2022 and a summary of the feedback is on Meta-wiki. The application period to join the Working Group is now open and is closing soon on April 10, 2022. Please review the information about the working group, share with community members who might be interested, and apply if you are interested.
There isn't a section on Commons:Requests_for_translation, I don't currently have a request (which I could certainly do myself) for this category. I realize that the possibility of people not translating because there is not a section, is that right?
I feel kind of bad about not helping about my own language and decided to post this; but this carries the risk of the post looking like spam. :) VScode fanboy (talk) 03:00, 29 March 2022 (UTC)
I plan to make some memes and some of them are pretty much Original Content, that is, no copyrighted content. I read the description of a few categories of memes and they seem to imply that only notable memes can (or should) be upload to the Commons. Is that the case, or can I upload my own memes too? Tetizeraz. Send me a ✉️ ! 07:25, 27 March 2022 (UTC)
doge replacement used at de:Doge (meme)Original, non-notable content that's clearly in scope because it is being used dozens of pages
@Tetizeraz: To elaborate a bit: We do have a bit of meme content that is not really notable on its own. Quite often, the original memes everyone knows are not suitable for Commons due to copyright issues. Then sometimes a free alternative that mirrors the style can be quite useful. Basically, Original Content is fine, as long as it serves (or can serve) an educational purpose. The threshold for what is considered "educational" can be somewhat blurry, but we tend to set it relatively low. --El Grafo (talk) 07:59, 29 March 2022 (UTC)
How to request translation of captions in a video?
Hello! Where do I request translation of captions for a video? I just uploaded this speech and would like to get the captions translated:
I am a recent changes patroller and administrator on a Wikipedia where @Sandro Halank has been updating or adding pictures of some identifiable people. I've noticed that many if not all of those pictures have no person's name in the file name (example: File:2022-03-22 ALBA Berlin gegen FC Barcelona Bàsquet (EuroLeague 2021-22) by Sandro Halank–043.jpg), caption or summary, making those changes tedious to patrol on a Wikipedia. Since the user refuses to further discuss the issue with me, I am asking here what can or should be done with photographs of identifiable people (is there a policy?) where the only information about the person is a Commons category, especially because
such information can be altered and lost easily (everyone can change categories, file names are stable);
the file's category information does not follow the file on Wikipedias;
when files are uploaded, the users are asked to give the most descriptive name, chosen according to what the image displays or contents portray. The files uploaded by Sandro do have in their name when, on which occasion and by whom (!) the photos were taken, but not whom they represent — and I'm assuming adding such information wouldn't be a big problem in a mass-upload tool that already gets the categories right.
While the information is still fresh and no one messed up the categories, would it be possible to rename the files here on Commons according to which person's category they're added to? Any advice for the uploader from more experienced users/admins here on Commons?
Sincerely (and totally in good faith), user Ponor (talk) 08:44, 29 March 2022 (UTC)
Would you please stop harassing other contributors? Becoming an administrator did not mean, you reached the Boss level in "playing Wikimedia". You are just a normal user as all. Your personal preferences are not the law for others. Sandro Halank as a valide, working system, since years. There's not just the one and only truth and answer to all questions. The title is the less important thing of all. To say, you can not use an image, because you can not find an image is simply untrue, due to the images are categorized. Siscriptions and categories are the important place for informations, not the titles. And this here is Commons, we don't need to "follow the file on Wikipedias"! And "the most descriptive name" in a series of images is a series title.
These are the moments, even the best contributors are frustrated and just think about running away. Let him work in peace! Marcus Cyron (talk) 10:16, 29 March 2022 (UTC)
I agree that administrators should remain humble. That is an issue separate from whether files should have certain names. In this type of conflict it is probably best not to use admin powers to force one's will. Adding a rename request to the file instead of renaming it oneself, or in this case, where it isn't about just an individual file, asking for third opinions, is probably a good choice. And if there is a conflict, a number of suboptimally named files isn't really a problem. I don't know whether that is the case, so I just share my thoughts on an individual filename like this:
Commons:File naming says that filenames should be "descriptive, chosen according to what the image displays or contents portray". According to Template:File renaming reasons/i18n a file can be moved if the name is "meaningless or ambiguous" to a name "that describes what the image particularly displays". We do not want to entirely rely on categories or descriptions, partly for the reasons given above, although we understand that not everything can be explained in the filename. I also understand that uploading many images one may want to keep to a scheme that doesn't involve writing much of the filename by hand. But this last point should not hinder people from adding the missing key information to the filename. Sandro Halank: I definitely think that including the depicted person's name in the filename (perhaps to the end, keeping the scheme intact at the start of the filename) would be a signisficant improvement to the file's usability.
File names are not much more than just a human readable identifier for the files. Renaming should only be done if the name is really meaningless. A name with the date and the event to photo was takes is definitely not meaningless. If the file name gets to descriptive there is also the problem that depending on usage context an other title would be useful. On this case a person could say "men with grey beard" is the most important feature of the image and renaming the file in this way. I agree that I also do not like adding the photographers name to the title but for now we do not have a policy against this. GPSLeo (talk) 10:59, 29 March 2022 (UTC)
@Marcus Cyron, how on earth is proposing a better scheme for file names to a user who has obviously done it better (File:2017-02-05 Ulla Zirne by Sandro Halank–4.jpg, File:2017-02-03 Vladislav Yuzhakov by Sandro Halank.jpg etc.) and can probably do it better by a press of a button, a *harassment*? My requests were patient and polite. I and other patrollers need to maintain Wikipedia:Verifiability on a Wikipedia, one part of that is knowing if a picture is a picture of Darius M. (unnamed) or Sandro H. (named), that's all. I did not go to Sandro as a "Boss of Wikipedia", I ended my request here as a "user". If anyone is being harassed it's this user by your tone and your allegations. But it's okay, I can live with that. Peace! Ponor (talk) 13:03, 29 March 2022 (UTC)
@Ponor: As a filemover (and one of the more prolific decliners of renaming requests), I think it's worth proposing files like that one for renaming under criterion 2 to add the name of the subject. Naming the particular basketball match is more precise than all the examples in COM:FR#cite note-2, but that isn't a photo of the match. It's a photo of a person that happens to have been taken at the match. On the other hand, I would say that File:2022-03-22 ALBA Berlin gegen FC Barcelona Bàsquet (EuroLeague 2021-22) by Sandro Halank–142.jpg doesn't warrant renaming, since it's actually a picture of the match in progress.
It's worth noting that Commons:File naming is not policy. We encourage the use of good filenames, but we don't generally treat non-descriptive names as worthy of sanction. Request renaming and move on. --bjh21 (talk) 11:20, 29 March 2022 (UTC)
Just stating the obvious here. The contributor uploaded 156 images of this event.
VicuñaUploader was used and just the uploading process in itself took 83 minutes. If the images were to be have been named descriptively that would add days to the process.
Descriptive renaming is optional, in this case the uploader actually took the trouble to cat each image usefully and comprehensively. So no room for criticism there. It's unusual for bulk uploaders to do it. All that’s missing are the usual OCD cats like Category:Bald men or men wearing singlets which doesn’t exist, but should LOL, or Category:Men wearing yellow shorts which does. Catting took a further 148 minutes.
Almost a 5 hour span devoted to this effort excluding whatever else, and using a generic title as a shortcut to speed it up. I'm not surprised they're not talking to you.
Some of these photos could be usefully renamed, no problem, however I have to say that we have millions of images that are much more worthy than these, of a barely notable event, for that kind of effort.
In addition to what's been said, while we encourage good file names, on the other hand we discourage renaming because it causes link rot outside the immediate wiki empire. --Broichmore (talk) 13:12, 29 March 2022 (UTC)
+1 Ponor says "do it better by a press of a button" - that's far away from reality. While one unique generic part of filenames are no problem, for that, what Ponor wants, every single filename must be changed by hand. This user (as me, too, e.g.) uploads sometimes some hunderts or thousends of useful pictures from one event. Broichmore is right: That would sometimes take days (!) additional (!) time, for no greater value. Because Ponor's statement "to have the valuable information lost (over time)" is simply not true. Nobody ever deletes the cats of the person from the photos. Never. --Stepro (talk) 16:32, 29 March 2022 (UTC)
@Bjh21: thanks for the explanation and the encouragement. If this was the only file from the user's recent uploads I would not mind proposing a rename, but there are tens of similar photos and I, unfortunately, do not have time to fix them one by one. Just trying to help. Those are all great photographs, and I thought it'd be a pity to have the valuable information lost (over time). (I never proposed any sanctions, I only thought having a discussion on naming schemes would benefit us all – you here on Commons, us there on Wikipedias). Ponor (talk) 13:19, 29 March 2022 (UTC)
There is nothing "to fix", because nothing is broken. If you don't want to check the photos added to articles in any Wikipedia, so do not patroling there. It's very curious to me, to check the filenames, but not the content. --Stepro (talk) 16:32, 29 March 2022 (UTC)
Having to check the content of files or the wikipedia articles the files are used in, every time you visit a category, can quickly feel rather cumbersome. So as a service to myself and my fellow contributors I regularly spend some time renaming files to include the name of the persons in it. Hjart (talk) 18:40, 29 March 2022 (UTC)
SVG file render incorrectly
In File:Electoral systems map.svg, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Macau are each assigned different colors, as can be seen in the static image preview generated by the commons system. However, in Firefox, when viewing the SVG file directly, all three places are being shown as having the same color of grey as Mainland China. Is there anything wrong with it? C933103 (talk) 12:20, 20 March 2022 (UTC)
Diff of Geobica's change (SVG files are XML and are very similar to HTML). Each territory on the map is identified by one or more SVG classes, and the colours are specified using CSS according to these classes. Most territories have one class, but each subnational area (where we have this problem) has an additional class for its parent country. Using Hong Kong for example: both cn and hk. The problem is caused by this additional cn class, which is causing the CSS selector that colours China grey to also apply to Hong Kong.
Before Geobica's edit, this was not a problem because the selector for Hong Kong included both classes: .cn.hk. The renderer gives higher priority to more specific selectors, so the correct colour was applied. Geobica's edit removed the class of the parent country from each selector for a subnational area (.cn.hk became .hk). The blue .hk selector thus has the same specificity as the grey .cn selector. When selectors have the same specificity, the selector that appears last should apply.
In this case, .hk appears first in the CSS, so our browsers are correct in prioritizing .cn. The PNGs differ because they are rendered by librsvg, which is known to be fairly buggy. I will try re-adding the selectors; we shall see if the problem that Geobica was trying to fix returns.
A tip: you can interactively examine parts of a rendered SVG using your browser's developer tools, which work with an opened SVG just as they do with a web page.
As suspected, now the PNGs are wrong. It seems Geobica was trying to avoid phab:T43423. I've reverted for now. There must be some established workaround—child selectors are very basic, and there are so many other derivatives of File:BlankMap-World.svg on Commons. — wqnvlz (talk·contribs) 07:31, 30 March 2022 (UTC)
Problem updating file
thumb which I uploaded, I did not crop properly. The image was created by screen capture on my iPad.
I have cropped it but cannot upload it as replacement. Get message file type does not match extension .png. If I save it to Dropbox I can change the extension, but I can't upload from Dropbox. What to do? Deisenbe (talk) 22:06, 24 March 2022 (UTC)
In your preferences go to the gadgets tab and scroll down to “Interface: Editing and uploads” and tick “CropTool” and click save. You’ll be able to go to the image and crop it. Bidgee (talk) 22:22, 24 March 2022 (UTC)
@Deisenbe: CropTool is always the preferred cropping method. Aside from being the most efficient method, more crucially it documents the change.
Sometimes you might want to overwrite an image with a new one, possibly one that you might have cropped elsewhere (on your desktop). It can happen that the image looks perfect, but is in fact corrupted and therefore unrecognisable (message file type does not match extension .png). A solution to that is to upload into GIMP and export it back as a refreshed file, png in this case.
You said If I save it to Dropbox I can change the extension, but I can't upload.... Changing the extension does not change the file type. There is only one exception to that rule and that's .jfif files, where you can manually change the extension to .jpg.
GIMP can convert any image to whatever extension you want.
As an aside Web sites prefer jpg as a format. The files are smaller, upload quicker, scale better than png, and crucially the quality of the image doesn’t noticeably degrade. Fatkun Batch download can (from source website to your desktop) automatically convert png's to .jpg. --Broichmore (talk) 13:37, 30 March 2022 (UTC)
render "use" in svg; make use of "href"
An upload of Synthese_von_Diazepam_nach_Leo_Sternbach.svg revealed that the use of an "href" parameter even in a "use" tag is ignored by our renderer even when pointing to a position in the same file. I'd appreciate very much if we could start publishing svg files with links into WP. We can link to any site in the world from within WP. Why is svg judged so much more dangerous that we don't allow client side rendering and then do not even support the use tag which necessarily is dependent on href param? --Vollbracht (talk) 00:06, 30 March 2022 (UTC)
I've been working with Peertube a bit the last few days, and have found the project has extremely easy to use import features. When the user supplies the URL of video site, the software will grab:
the video file
subtitle files
title and description
license information
first published date
This information is gathered using yt-downloader and yt-dl, well known open source tools that parse a great variety of video sites, several of which support open content licensing other than Vimeo and YT.
It strikes me that WM Commons could use this tool for video imports, just as the Flickr tool does now. It could be restricted to registered users or some other group if necessary. I wondered if this has been considered? I upload a lot of video content and it is very cumbersome currently to manually import the same information. --JimKillock (talk) 18:05, 30 March 2022 (UTC)
I see! Well that is a very good thing - perhaps it needs a bit more advertising, for instance on the upload page, would be helpful. --JimKillock (talk) 20:12, 30 March 2022 (UTC)
Why I am deleting my account
Hi everyone,
Several of my files were deleted at once, without warning. Usual stuff some people will say, but please read this.
Another one : I loaded a picture I took with my camera, showing a simple wall of bricks (to illustrate local brick style). Can I consider myself to be the rights owner for a picture of a stupid wall that I took myself ? Apparently no, my file was deleted.
Thinking about it, the problem in those 2 examples is not that the files are not suitable for Commons, the problem is a wrong choice of license when uploading. Instead of advising the newcomer about the mistake, instead of pointing out a solution, instead of talking and trying to help, the only action from experienced users is an automatic "your file was deleted, too bad...". Truth is the license system in Commons is a real maze. Instead of deleting people's work without notice, I think it would be better to spend time to create good tutorials, or a simple page with simple explanations about the most common cases. For example : I upload my own picture of everyday's life=pick up license#1, I upload my own picture of a piece of art in a museum=pick up license#2, I upload my best buddy picture of his dog=pick up license#3, etc. I have read tons of material on Commons. The more I read, the more confused i got. For instance, about "Fair use", there is a couple of pages with a lot of prattle but very little useful information. I don't give a damn about Spanish, English or Dutch wikipedia, I just wanna know if Commons allows it or not. One clear sentence would be enough.
I agreed after discussion that some of the files I uploaded were to be removed, I did a mistake but this does not mean all my work is garbage... Why delete all of my files with the exact same argument ? They don't come from the same source, it is easy to check... But apparently nobody did, most users on Commons are like robots. Moreover those files don't belong to the same thematic, they have nothing in common except they were uploaded by the same user : me. Do I need to stress that hounding and harassment [[7]] are forbidden on wiki projects ?
Farewell my dear bots,
Enjoy your time deleting other people's work
Not that it matters anymore, but regarding Fair Use, it does not get much clearer than the big red warning saying "Fair use" media files are not allowed on Wikimedia Commons at the start of COM:FAIRUSE. --HyperGaruda (talk) 06:03, 31 March 2022 (UTC)
The one point where I agree with the departing user is that there is a lack of good tutorials and helpful help pages on licensing. Just as an example, let's say I find a photograph that fulfills the requirement for "PD-old for Ethiopian photographies". So, I can quickly slap the clearly wrong license on the image (indiscriminate "pd-old"); or spend an hour looking for the correct template and likely give up trying; or I don't bother with a license which leaves a chance that the image will be deleted by a different random patroller.
On substance on the bemoaned fair use - yeah that is just not possible here on Commons and Yann/Garuda covered it. Enyavar (talk) 07:37, 31 March 2022 (UTC)
The problem about clear instructions, stems from the fact that there are so many "typical cases" and many of them are full of pitfalls: picture of everyday's life could involve personality rights issues, the piece of art can be old enough to be allowed depending on its history, your buddy's photo needs VRT permission, for which there are many different cases etc. The graphic shown at the Upload Wizard's start page covers the simple cases, anything beyond that at least may be complicated. We have indeed done our best to provide clear guidance, but it is hard to do that properly.
The robot-like behaviour comes from the fact that there are many more uploaders that don't understand copyright than there are experienced users around to educate them. We just need to get rid of those copyright violations without spending too much time on each. If a user makes several mistakes, the probability that the next upload claimed as "own work" would in fact be in the public domain is too small for an admin to start a discussion or making the needed research themself.
The second one was deleted as it was in Spanish, and all files carried to the first one, that is in English. First of all, the moving of the files is totally correct.
What I object is to the deleting of the Spanish version. I have recreated it as a Category Redirect. There is a reason for it.
Firstly, take into account that not everybody speaks English. Some people do not speak or understand a single word of the English language. I'm thinking, for instance, about people who have pictures of un mitin de Vicente Furriol, allá en 1932, people that most likely speak only Spanish and with a proud Buñolero accent. So leaving such a route open for such people to find the proper category is necessary.
Secondly, while Communist Party of Spain is a sensible translation of Partido Comunista de España, it has to be taken into account the existance of other parties with very simmilar names. There are categories for PCE (m-l), for UCE, for PCPE and some others. Someone not finding a Partido Comunista de España category could use another one as the best substitute available.
I think that leaving a Category Redirect helps some people while it doesn't harm anybody. This argument -in my humble opinion- would also work for many other category names.
"In cases where it's likely that a new user might try to use the old category by accident, it's best to retain it as a redirect. This might include alternatives that are equally valid or synonyms; older and outdated terms; translations; or some other correct expectable name for the category. In such cases, the old category should be marked permanently with a {{Category redirect}} template."
This kind of thing is of no use to any researcher IMO. It certainly takes up a lot of work, from valuable contributors, that could be better used elewhere. What does the community think, do you agree they are superfluous? --Broichmore (talk) 10:49, 29 March 2022 (UTC)
@Ricky81682: I'm afraid that what seemed a good idea is in fact an illusion. Cats concerning numbers might be useful, if you were chinese and wanted images that include the lucky number 8.
There are cat of images with numbers in them which are used as deep research aids for identifying unidentified ships, as an example. Ships with a certain pennant or hull number, or Ships with 3 funnels, or Four-masted ships. Or combinations of these. Others on the list would be fishing boats, or even very early car number plates?
For numbering of periodicals and books it's another matter. They are best served in the metadata of an image.
COM:C assumes we're going to be sensible about creating cats, it implies that you'll associate a single subject with a given category. Volume numbers in themselves are qualifiers not subjects, but White shirts can be.
It is essential that every file can be found by browsing the category structure. . Every cat should fully enable this mandate.
Cats are used to ID images or files, The user wants to search for Volume 2, of Harper's magazine. That's served by best by Volume 2 being in the data cell. In the Harper's tree is Harper's magazine, Volume 2. The User has no use in sifting through every volume 2 ever purchased. The latter means nothing, when its not defined.
Harper's Weekly, Volume 4 is valuable, and a search criteria. Volume 4 in itself, and by itself, is entirely useless.
Okay, then propose their deletion. I really don't see the difference of keeping track of every work with a particular number or the number on every object or the number 12 on various books and magazines but this is so "bizarre" to be problematic. As I said, people had and have been categorizing them by the numeral for years so I consolidated the publications into a subcategory. Diffusing them back up seems to be exactly the same thing to me unless you don't want them under the numerals and that's a broader discussion. -- Ricky81682 (talk) 05:42, 31 March 2022 (UTC)
@Ricky81682: As you cant see the difference. I have revised my description (above), in an effort to be more understandable.
@Broichmore: It helps answer "I see 'Vol. 33' on the spine or cover of a book in this photo or video, but the other text is obscured. Which book might it be?". That could help analysis in case of a kidnapping. — Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me10:41, 1 April 2022 (UTC)
@Broichmore I see your point but I don't know why this particular set of categories has to fit that specific criteria. I don't see Category:Number 33 on vehicle registration plates as early car number plates but every car plate with the number 33 on it. You point out that the greater categorization with numbers could be problematic (or an illusion of a good idea) but don't actually want to propose the mass elimination of larger categories. Admitting that the category exists and for whatever reason you are not disputing the category, would you agree that every periodical with volume or issue number 33 would belong within Category:Number 33 on objects? If you don't think so, I don't know how to make you see that people were categorizing things that way (in particular under the numeral categories) other than the fact that many images were categorized that way. As I said, propose it for deletion if you feel like you have an argument. You seem to have a criteria of how Commons should be organized (or a defined 'client' you expect to use it), complain about one set of categories that do not fit that criteria, ignore the fact that larger sets of the parent categories also do not fit your criteria and then ignore the larger hidden point that your client criteria isn't actually a concern of anyone here. If you want to propose a more specific criteria for the mandate and then propose the mass deletion of categories that all fail that mandate, that's fine. If you want to propose the deletion of these categories for failing that mandate, fine, but that this point I don't see your interpretation of this mandate anything other than your personal annoyance at this very specific categorization. Why not propose a Commons:Category scheme Texts like we have at Commons:Category scheme People and propose to use language, date, subject-matter or other criteria with volume/issue # be eliminated? It would resolve this much more simply without getting into the larger images issues and without us going in circles. I suspect you don't actually want a resolution on these matters, just to lecture about how things should be organized here. I am more than happy to start the category scheme discussion to actually have some movement on this topic. -- Ricky81682 (talk) 10:53, 1 April 2022 (UTC)
Logos of Government Ministries of India
User Swapnil1101 (talk·contribs) has uploaded a dozens of logos of different ministries of India as Own work. {{GODL-India}} does not cover official logos and as such it won't apply. Would these be considered as copyright violations? If not, which tag should be placed on them? Any help would be greatly appreciated. --Taggers (talk) 11:29, 30 March 2022 (UTC)
"Emblem of India" is in Public Domain and Text LOGO (The New York Times, Microsoft) don't violate copyright. So this license will be suitable. Swapnil1101 (talk) 12:28, 30 March 2022 (UTC)
Problem with upload of GeoJSON (<mapframe>: The JSON content is not valid GeoJSON+simplestyle. The first validation error is on the element "/0/query": "The property query is required".)
with new valid GeoJSON code, that can be visualized with any GeoJSON viewer, e.g. geojson.io.
But somehow the error message...
<mapframe>: The JSON content is not valid GeoJSON+simplestyle. The first validation error is on the element "/0/query": "The property query is required".
I was finally able to fix the problem. The error occured because property values, that expect a number as input, had quotation marks in them (e.g. "stroke-opacity": "1" instead of "stroke-opacity": 1. After removing the quotation marks the error message disappeared. --Renek78 (talk) 07:22, 2 April 2022 (UTC)
It looks like publicly using letter Z on e.g. posters can be more and more dangerous and criminal, should we consider showing it may face-to-face {{Nazi symbol}}-like issues, and then create a tag to let remote users know such issues?
Oppose Nobody has banned the Z symbol yet. Lithuania is considering banning it and others may follow, but any talk of adding a reuse warning is premature. Nosferattus (talk) 17:35, 27 March 2022 (UTC)
Well I was wrong about that. Regardless, it looks like the context of the use is important in the jurisdictions that have banned it, so I would still be reluctant to create a generalized warning for the letter Z. Nosferattus (talk) 04:26, 5 April 2022 (UTC)
Oppose It is very unlikely that an image from Commons is going to be used in a way that would trigger a reaction from the police without your anticipating it when planning the use. If you show support for the Russian invasion in e.g. Germany without being a German citizen, you should understand that you may get yourself a problem (and check up on it), and if you are a German engaged in the conflict, you should know of the swastika laws and understand the issues with the Z without the help of Commons. –LPfi (talk) 09:39, 28 March 2022 (UTC)
Oppose using Z does not mean supporting Russian invasion of Ukraine. I would be OK with adding warning in the description of files in Category:2022 Russian Invasion vehicle markings that in some countries displaying those symbols might be illegal, but we do not need it on all the files displaying letter Z, like the ones below
The problem is that any of the symbols above would be more likely to be shown in a way breaching the law than those images actually depicting the Russian symbol. –LPfi (talk) 13:01, 28 March 2022 (UTC)
Yeah, for NYCS' Z service route, I contacted MTA by their online contact us form, that whether MTA is currently considering to change it to another alphabet (or e.g. the number 8). Likely I plan to ask Tokyo Metro and Kintetsu by the like way, to know that whether change the route marks of Hanzōmon Line (Q1376030) and Nishi-Shigi Cable Line (Q8140289) are currently considering (both are marked Z, see 12). However I'm having no idea if JR West is also considering it or not due to Fukuen Line (Q899394). Liuxinyu970226 (talk) 13:41, 28 March 2022 (UTC)
Oppose Your talking about putting warnings against a letter of the alphabet??? An unwelcome precedent. Its not yet a symbol but just a hand daubed mark on a tank, and not any of the illustrations here. We don't need to do anything. I'm sure Germans know already what to do, without our help. --Broichmore (talk) 13:34, 29 March 2022 (UTC)
Not only german, but also Czechia and Kazakhstan are banned Z. PS: Pennysylvania, the hometown state of US President Biden, is also considering to disallow showing "lonely Z" on public transport signs. Liuxinyu970226 (talk) 09:44, 30 March 2022 (UTC)
Support creation of such a disclaimer/warning-template. It should be used diligently, like the existing Nazi-symbol-template. Per recent legal-expert opinion[8], use of "Z" with the above described intention was already punishable in Germany per §140, no.2 Strafgesetzbuch (penal code) of Germany. --Túrelio (talk) 10:05, 30 March 2022 (UTC)
Oppose can people in the free world please not fall for self-censorship so easily? for now i see no need to use a template to play up some countries' hysteria and paranoia. RZuo (talk) 08:21, 31 March 2022 (UTC)
May be you don't understand the proposal. Nobody here asks for banning this symbol. This is about placing a warning for re-users that in some countries, such as in Germany, the use of this symbol (not simply the letter Z) is illegal and might be prosecuted. And thanks for attacking other sovereign countries. --Túrelio (talk) 10:43, 31 March 2022 (UTC)
@Túrelio: you clearly dont understand the proposal, as well as my reply. many countries have various laws banning display and use of all kinds of things, but commons dont need such templates to warn users of blasphemy, lèse-majesté and whatnot. why the obsession with european laws? and in this case, the absurdity of the laws affecting parts of the alphabet is in itself controversial.
Support States having banned the symbol is definitely relevant to many viewers, similar to common practice with communist symbols. Zoozaz1 (talk) 22:29, 6 April 2022 (UTC)
Would be similar template applied to media from Ukrainian sources? Same for any media produced by military forces of any country. --EugeneZelenko (talk) 14:54, 30 March 2022 (UTC)
Support a template warning about war propaganda, but not all documents from Mil.ru are war propaganda. Yann (talk) 14:58, 30 March 2022 (UTC)
it should be a template akin to the "xyz is sponsored by abc government" banner on youtube/twitter, rather than a template arbitrating on the content of the file and the page. it's impossible for commons to judge in every case what is biased and what isnt.
Oppose No reason for implementation, judging whether a source is biased or not (even though it clearly is) is not commons' job. Zoozaz1 (talk) 22:26, 6 April 2022 (UTC)
Info You open Category:1960s maps of Uganda, remove the last indention, and save it. By doing this, the category reflects the latest edit of the template. It will, by the way, not appear on the history of your edits or the category, because removing the last indention is less than a minor edit. --トトト (talk) 16:04, 3 March 2022 (UTC)
Done Pi.1415926535 (talk) 04:00, 11 March 2022 (UTC)
wikimedia.org
wikimedia.org.
This section is resolved and can be archived. If you disagree, replace this template with your comment. --RZuo (talk) 12:38, 20 March 2022 (UTC) 
.png)
hugarheimur 09:59, 25 March 2022 (UTC)
Support A disclaimer to notify reusers of potential risks may be a good idea. We might include a hint though to use this only for the actual military symbols and not for apparently similar logos like File:Zurich Insurance Group Logo Horizontal.svg. De728631 (talk) 14:24, 27 March 2022 (UTC)
Oppose Nobody has banned the Z symbol yet. Lithuania is considering banning it and others may follow, but any talk of adding a reuse warning is premature. Nosferattus (talk) 17:35, 27 March 2022 (UTC)
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