Commons:Village pump/Archive/2024/07

Urgent: As Media of the Day predestined video with all white preview image

Hello, this is kind of urgent: The video File:Drone video of Keila waterfall and manor in Keila-Joa, Estonia.webm which is selected as Media of the Day for 8th of July, so in just 3 days (without the recent one I am writing this), does only display an all white preview image. Can do someone a fast repair? — Speravir – 23:07, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

Thanks for bringing this up, but there is a simple solution: we can choose a certain time as the frame that is the thumbnail. Input thumbtime= to make a different thumbnail. E.g. [[File:Drone video of Keila waterfall and manor in Keila-Joa, Estonia.webm|thumb|thumbtime=10]] looks like:

So we should be okay as long as someone chooses a good time for a thumbnail frame. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 23:34, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

Justin, I know, but this does not work for Media of the Day. I have forgotten to link to it above, but added this just now, or take a look from here: {{Motd/2024-07-08}} – yes, it is a template. — Speravir – 23:44, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

What do you think of this: https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Template%3AMotd%2F2024-07-08&diff=891850543&oldid=890322763 —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 23:49, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

Oh, and ! I think, this should be documented somewhere, {{Motd}} or {{Motd filename}} or both. By the way: Strange enough, even thumbtime=0 seems to work. — Speravir – 00:07, 4 July 2024 (UTC)

So, I consider this fast resolved. — Speravir – 00:07, 4 July 2024 (UTC)

@Koavf: Unfortunately your change broke the template, it seems. Wouldn’t Template:Motd/2024-07-08_thumbtime be the right way to handle this? --Geohakkeri (talk) 07:32, 4 July 2024 (UTC)

It's only broken on the language-agnostic version, not the translations. Template:Motd/2024-07-08 thumbtime does not display the actual media. Whatever solution others think works is fine by me. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 07:35, 4 July 2024 (UTC)

At least now it displays a reasonable title, even if it has an extraneous bit. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 07:37, 4 July 2024 (UTC)

And now it just looks correct on the template. Great work. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 08:07, 4 July 2024 (UTC)

Thanks. Templates can be quite tricky sometimes. --Geohakkeri (talk) 08:21, 4 July 2024 (UTC)

Thank you, Geohakkeri for the custom fix. It should in general, though, be available as template parameter. I do not have just gone into the deep details of it yet. — Speravir – 00:03, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

@Speravir: No, it was Justin (koavf) who made the custom fix. I fixed it in general. --Geohakkeri (talk) 06:38, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

@Geohakkeri: I referred to your Special:Diff/891951137 and did not like this approach – I thought of a parameter {{{thumbtime}}} instead. But I’ve also said I hadn’t looked into details. I’ve meanwhile noticed that my idea could not work, and you’ve essentially just adapted some code from {{Motd}}. — Speravir – 23:49, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

This section was archived on a request by: --Speravir 23:49, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

Disease-related deaths in Beijing

Everything, I sampled in Category:Disease-related deaths in Beijing, is complete bollocks.

Executions, airline crashes, and old age are not Disease-related. Looks like vandalism to me. What to do? Broichmore (talk) 18:14, 1 July 2024 (UTC)

How do I request the speedy closure of a deletion nomination?

Hi. I have commented on the deletion nomination for an image of an Indonesian Government official. The original reason for the nomination was (in Spanish) "Who is it?". As far as I can figure out, simply not knowing who a person is, isn't a reason for a deletion nomination. So, I believe the nomination to be invalid, but can't find out how to get it reviewed and potentially shut down. In my opinion, it was possibly a bad faith nomination, because as soon as I categorised it (as it hadn't got any categories when uploaded), the nominator responded to say that he was "pleased to have drawn attention to the lack of categories" and would "thank me again when I added the correct ones". I'm not sure what to do with it. DaneGeld (talk) 12:38, 1 July 2024 (UTC)

@DaneGeld: Why haven't you linked it in the discussion here? If everyone is now in agreement that it should be kept, including the original nominator, then any experienced user (not just an admin) can close it as a speedy keep by clear consensus. - Jmabel ! talk 19:25, 1 July 2024 (UTC)

And ideally shouldn’t be closed by an involved user with the DR (other than the nominator). Bidgee (talk) 19:38, 1 July 2024 (UTC)

@Jmabel - I didn't link the discussion because I have fallen foul of being misconstrued as fishing for comments on discussions in the past, which is apparently frowned upon. I simply avoided it as I was asking for advice, rather than seeking others to comment on it. DaneGeld (talk) 21:48, 1 July 2024 (UTC)

@DaneGeld: in the future: state what you are wanting as neutrally as possible, and link the mention on VP or similar page from the discussion in question, so that you are clearly not doing anything surreptitious. - Jmabel ! talk 21:53, 1 July 2024 (UTC)

I've closed this nomination. Omphalographer (talk) 20:18, 1 July 2024 (UTC)

Thank you. DaneGeld (talk) 21:52, 1 July 2024 (UTC)

Commons Gazette 2024-07

Currently, there are 184 sysops.

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Edited by RZuo (talk).

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Commons Gazette is a monthly newsletter of the latest important news about Wikimedia Commons, edited by volunteers. You can also help with editing!

--RZuo (talk) 21:23, 1 July 2024 (UTC)

Discussion on UAE copyright law before 1992

Hello. Kindly visit Commons talk:Copyright rules by territory/United Arab Emirates#‎UAE Copyright law before 1992 for the discussion. Regards, JWilz12345 (Talk|Contrib's.) 02:49, 2 July 2024 (UTC)

What's the best title for the category

Video game videos by name or Videos of video games by name--Trade (talk) 12:53, 1 July 2024 (UTC)

It seems like similar categories start with "videos", but "videos of video games" just sounds clunky. So who knows. --Adamant1 (talk) 12:58, 1 July 2024 (UTC)

I don't think you can get around repeating "video".

Also there is Commons:Categories for discussion/2024/04/Category:Video game videos. Enhancing999 (talk) 20:09, 1 July 2024 (UTC)

Another existing option is "Videos related to video games", which seems to be what the main category actually contains. "Video game videos" sounds like cutscenes and "Videos of video games" sounds like gameplay. Why "by name" and not "by game"? Sinigh (talk) 10:36, 2 July 2024 (UTC)

We already use by name for "Indie video games by name‎" and similar others so i assumed we needed to be consistent? Trade (talk) 15:01, 2 July 2024 (UTC)

Yes, but what I reckon is that "Indie video games by name‎" refers to the names of the indie games and, following the same logic, "Videos of video games by name" would then refer to the names of the videos rather than the names of the associated games. But I'm not sure, so take this with a grain of salt! Sinigh (talk) 16:24, 2 July 2024 (UTC)

Acceptableness of having a source template also provide author information

Hello, {{Web source}} is a template for providing links to the sources of files uploaded from other places on the web. It currently has two (undocumented) parameters which are set up to provide author information, |author= and |photographer=. This seems a little odd to me because usually in templates like {{Information}} author and source information is listed separately instead of on the same line. For this reason, I am wondering if the current set up with {{Web source}} is inline with general Commons best practices and if it would be worthwhile to deprecate the parameters. For reference, the |photographer= parameter is currently only used about a dozen times and I haven't been able to find any uses of |author=. Thanks for any feedback and take care. —The Editor's Apprentice (Talk) 00:49, 2 July 2024 (UTC)

That's probably why they aren't documented. - Jmabel ! talk 03:25, 2 July 2024 (UTC)

The template was apparently thought primarily for artworks and to be used within template:artwork and similar templates and situations (although it can certainly be used in other contexts also). The template:artwork has a line "source/photographer", on the same line (which is somewhat strange and impractical, but it's been like that forever and unlikely to be changed easily). Therefore, it makes sense that template:web_source is compatible and includes relevant related parameters. I suppose that, in the line source/photographer of template:artwork, users may find practical to place the photographer inside the same template:web_source rather than outside it. Also, it must be noted that template:web_source is embedded in other templates, such as template:From_Google_Art_Project. Not sure about the parameter "author", but it might have a potential use in some such other circumstances. I would hesitate to just remove stuff from templates like that. Did you think of consulting the creator of the template (who is still active on Commons)? -- Asclepias (talk) 05:40, 2 July 2024 (UTC)

You're right, the |photographer= parameter does indeed mirror the set up of {{Artwork}}, so its not a complete anomaly and it would make sense for them to be compatible since they are often used together. I indeed share your hesitation to outright remove functionality from templates which is in part why I started this discussion. You're also right to ask about my consulting Zolo as the creator of the template. Usually in similar circumstances that is something I do, but since I was thinking about general best practices/acceptability, in this case I ended up going to a public forum first. That said, I would be interested in hearing about @Zolo's intentions and thought process, both for {{Web source}} as a whole and the |author= and |photographer= parameters in particular. Thanks to you both and please take care. —The Editor's Apprentice (Talk) 20:06, 2 July 2024 (UTC)

The template:artwork displays at the front end, "source/photographer", but not within the code, presumably photographer intended there is the scanner, and not the original photographer. Scanners in that sense exist for any and all GLAM products we have. These days we enter the url there, only a few years ago that might have, had to be the GLAM or an individual by name.

Interestingly |photographer= can be added into the artwork template, so I'll use it from here. Before I was putting that name under artist.

I'm probably doing this the wrong way, but for author I sometimes put in the author of the book the photo came from, or the full name of the artist/ photographer, whereas in artist I might put in the shortened signed name from the piece in question. Then sometimes I want to use the author field to put in the full unabbreviated name.

In any event, if the photo came, from say, en:Life (magazine), I would have; Life under the author, after all, they probably commissioned it, the photographer being a staffer.

I'm sorry, I wouldn’t use this template for anything. It's far too glib. Most of the photographs I upload come from GLAM's, and I use the {{Artwork}} template for them. The GLAM collection information being important here, especially the accession number. I really don't see why we would want to encourage glib uploading of any item, ignoring attribution, and this template, by its brevity, does exactly that.

We face an oncoming rush of AI derived images of epidemic proportions. The provenance and sourcing of where images come from, and their legitimacy is something we need to beef up, and I fear the project is asleep at the wheel on this issue. – Broichmore (talk) 11:25, 2 July 2024 (UTC)

Must admit. I'm getting tired of these author templates that takes up half my screen for no good reason other than to look fancy--Trade (talk) 15:06, 2 July 2024 (UTC)

[Month] [Year] in [Place] - photos taken on, or photos of events that occurred

I have a question regarding categories [Month] [Year] in [Place], e.g. Category:June 2024 in Kraków. If there's a subcategory belonging to it, does it mean:

• Photos are be taken on [Month] [Year], or,
• Photos of the event that occurred on [Month] [Year]?

For example:

• Category:2024 Jagiellonian University pro-Palestinian campus occupation‎

Category contains photos taken on June 2024, but the occupation event started on May 2024. Apart of the Category:June 2024 in Kraków, should it belong to Category:May 2024 in Kraków then?

Dwxn (talk) 11:16, 2 July 2024 (UTC)

If a category like this belongs as a parent category of Category:2024 Jagiellonian University pro-Palestinian campus occupation‎, yes, I'd also include Category:May 2024 in Kraków. But my own feeling is that it should simply use Category:2024 events in Kraków, and the month-specific categories should be on individual photos. - Jmabel ! talk 19:10, 2 July 2024 (UTC)

Suppression d'un visuel

Bonjour,

Il y a plus de 11 ans, une personne a posté une photo de moi prise dans un cadre privé. Aujourd'hui, je souhaite vraiment qu'elle soit supprimée car elle peut me porter préjudice au travail. J'ai proposé sa suppression à plusieurs mais elle n'est jamais supprimée. Je ne sais plus quoi faire. Merci de m'aider. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sayamelyay5 (talk • contribs) 21:34, 1 July 2024 (UTC)

@Sayamelyay5:

1. Is the picture in use on one of our sister projects, such as one of the Wikipedias?
2. Have you requested deletion as a personal courtesy or on some other basis?
3. You say the picture was the picture was taken in a private place. Was it with or without your consent?
4. Also, could you say what country, because issues about this vary widely from country to country.

Jmabel ! talk 21:56, 1 July 2024 (UTC)

Also, having looked slightly further into this: are you sure the picture in question has not already been deleted? Please check. - Jmabel ! talk 22:06, 1 July 2024 (UTC)

See Commons:Deletion requests/File:Sandrine Lefebvre-Reghay photo.png. I deleted the file in question as F10. Pi.1415926535 (talk) 22:11, 1 July 2024 (UTC)

Mille mercis. Y a t il un délai de suppression dans Google ? Bien à vous Sayamelyay5 (talk) 22:20, 1 July 2024 (UTC)

Bonsoir,

J'ai vérifié. Je la vois toujours sur Google en tapant mon nom.

Bien à vous Sayamelyay5 (talk) 22:19, 1 July 2024 (UTC)

Google takes some time to update its cache.

Anyway, the photo is no longer in Commons. If what Google shows is a problem, it should be dealt with Google. Pere prlpz (talk) 08:17, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

Template:Swiss Government Portrait

Could anyone proficient in German fix the dead link? --Trade (talk) 21:24, 2 July 2024 (UTC)

I am not proficient at all but I guess the links should be https://www.admin.ch/gov/de/start/bundesrat/geschichte-des-bundesrats/bundesraete-und-ihre-wahl/alle-bundesraete-liste.html and https://www.admin.ch/gov/de/start/bundeskanzlei/bundeskanzlerin/alle-bundeskanzler-liste.html. --Geohakkeri (talk) 05:53, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

The Community Wishlist is reopening July 15, 2024

Here’s what to expect, and how to prepare.

Hello everyone, the new Community Wishlist (formerly Community Wishlist Survey) opens on 15 July for piloting. I will jump straight into an FAQ to help with some questions you may have:

Q: How long do I have to submit wishes?

A: As part of the changes, Wishlist will remain open. There is no deadline for wish submission.

Q: What is this ‘Focus Area’ thing?

A: The Foundation will identify patterns with wishes that share a collective problem and group them into areas known as ‘Focus Areas’. The grouping of wishes will begin in August 2024.

Q: At what point do we vote? Are we even still voting?

A: Contributors are encouraged to discuss and vote on Focus Areas to highlight the areas.

Q: How will this new system move wishes forward for addressing?

A: The Foundation, affiliates, and volunteer developers can adopt Focus Areas. The Wikimedia Foundation is committed to integrating Focus Areas into our Annual Planning for 2025-26.

Focus Areas align to hypotheses (specific projects, typically taking up to one quarter) and/or Key Results (broader projects taking up to one year).

Q: How do I submit a wish? Has anything changed about submissions?

A: Yes there are some changes. Please have a look at the guide.

I hope the FAQ helped. You can read more about the launch.

You are encouraged to start drafting your wishes at your pace. Please consult the guide as you do so. Also if you have an earlier unfulfilled wish that you want to re-submit, we are happy to assist you draft.

You can start your draft (see an example) and don't hesitate to ask for support when drafting by sending me a link to your draft/sandbox via Meta email to help/review it. Alternatively you can leave the link in the Drafts List. –– STei (WMF) (talk) 14:36, 4 July 2024 (UTC)

Script for deletion sorting?

Is there a script/tool I can use to assist deletion sorting? I regularly come across DRs that should be categorized, or which were never updated with the result. There are a few such scripts on enwp, but deletion sorting works differently there. — Rhododendrites ^talk |  14:17, 2 July 2024 (UTC)

Apparently not, so now there's User:Rhododendrites/drsort.js. Still a work in progress. Please leave feedback/advice on the talk page. — Rhododendrites ^talk |  13:26, 6 July 2024 (UTC)

IA Upload issues with DJVU files

I've uploaded the below three DJVU files from the Internet Archive using the IA Upload tool and there are issues. There is a warning in the files saying "This file type may contain malicious code. By executing it, your system may be compromised." and the files' dimensions are 0 x 0. Any idea what is going on and how to fix this?

• File:Hannibal and the Crisis of the Struggle between Carthage and Rome.djvu
• File:Theodoric the Goth, the Barbarian Champion of Civilisation.djvu
• File:Oliver Cromwell and the Rule of the Puritans in England.djvu

Ciridae (talk) 06:28, 12 July 2024 (UTC)

I purged the pages and the details came right up. This is something that has been happening for a while with PDFs and DJVUs. Likely the file page is sometimes rendered before the metadata is available (race condition). It then gets cached until you edit or purge it. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 08:33, 12 July 2024 (UTC)

@TheDJ: Thank you! What are the steps to purge a page? There is a similar issue with File:The National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey, 2010-2012 State Report.pdf. Ciridae (talk) 17:14, 12 July 2024 (UTC)

Help:Purge is the solution. Ciridae (talk) 17:57, 12 July 2024 (UTC)

This section is resolved and can be archived. If you disagree, replace this template with your comment. Ciridae (talk) 17:57, 12 July 2024 (UTC)

Categories by day: date format?

Dates that clarify or disambiguate categories, such as categories for individual sports matches, should they be written as 6 October 2021 or 2021-10-06?

I would assume that the all-numeric format is the better option, since it automatically sorts similarly named categories by date, and since categories for specific days use that format (e.g. Category:2021-10-06). But both formats are in use and I haven't been able to find any instructions as to which one should be used in these cases.

Sinigh (talk) 11:38, 2 July 2024 (UTC)

In the HTML script stick with 2021-10-06 format. Broichmore (talk) 18:24, 2 July 2024 (UTC)

Yes, definitely! But what about the name of the category? Sinigh (talk) 18:33, 2 July 2024 (UTC)

If it's down to an individual day, I'd strongly favor ISO notation (2021-10-06 in this case). If it was just the month, then June 2021. - Jmabel ! talk 19:12, 2 July 2024 (UTC)

 Agree. I think both of those choices make the most sense for category trees. Sinigh (talk) 20:28, 2 July 2024 (UTC)

I've been using the format '2023-01 text' for categories where only the month matters (if not only the year). I think that is the most reasonable standard so that the cats are sorted chronologically on category pages. Prototyperspective (talk) 21:48, 2 July 2024 (UTC)

You can also solve that with a DEFAULTSORT. - Jmabel ! talk 22:45, 2 July 2024 (UTC)

I know but they are (more) unreliable and why not simply use this format putting the verbatim month into the title isn't useful and just causes problems due to people not adding a sortkey and the title longer. Prototyperspective (talk) 11:40, 4 July 2024 (UTC)

Yes, there are defaultsorting navigational templates for month categories. Sinigh (talk) 13:19, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

"both formats are in use"

where is "6 October 2021" systematically in use?

in any case, prefer yyyy-mm-dd over other formats. RZuo (talk) 16:33, 4 July 2024 (UTC)

Good question, I should have provided an example in my first post. I'm referring to categories like those you'll find in this one: Category:Women's association football matches in Sweden. In this particular case, there seems to be a preference for a comma followed by "M Month YYYY", but dates in brackets are not uncommon elsewhere. (This category also showcases the typically arbitrary mix of "vs", "v", and hyphens both with and without spaces, and not a single unspaced en dash to be seen.) Sinigh (talk) 18:39, 4 July 2024 (UTC)

Tyresö FF-Umeå IK, 16 April 2013‎ should be the agreed format IMO. This is the date format used by Wikipedia too, in the main. The numerical date in reverse, can be hidden from view to force sorting. Broichmore (talk) 09:35, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

If so, please note that the first punctuation mark should be an en dash: Tyresö FF–Umeå IK. As for the date format, that soccer game is actually a very good example for this thread. The category for the date itself is numeric: Category:2013-04-16, which contains two sports games with Day-Month name-Year dates, but also 60+ categories, in and including Category:Photographs taken on 2013-04-16‎, that instead use the all-numeric format. At the same time, there is indeed a general preference for the Day-Mn-Year format across Wikimedia. So you understand why I saw the need to ask my initial question.

Maybe it's intentional that date formats vary depending on the subject on the category? Sinigh (talk) 13:31, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

sports matches is a topic that needs a standard the most, but it seems commons never had a standard?

i just made some considerations:

1. there're two kinds of matches: two sided matches and "first past the post" matches (like track and field, borrowing an election jargon).
2. i think for two sided matches it's easy. the category title should include both teams' names and the date, that's all.
3. in the rare case when on the same day there are more than one match between teams with the same names (e.g. both a football match and a handball match between both france and japan), then we can add the actual sport as the disambiguation, e.g. France vs Japan (2022-11-11, U17 women's football), France vs Japan (2022-11-11, women's football). in the rare case when two sides face each other more than once on the same day, titles can be John Doe vs John Smith (2022-11-11, 1st), John Doe vs John Smith (2022-11-11, 2nd)
4. vs, v., -, or something else, which symbol to use, is up to community to decide.
5. for matches that're not between exactly two sides, i guess titles can just be the name of the event, from big to small, e.g. 2024 summer olympics - women's 100m freestyle - qualifier - group b (2024-11-11).
6. absolutely no reason not to use yyyy-mm-dd. other formats are messy for everything -- appeareance, sorting, intelligibility for non-english speakers, problem of preference between en-gb and en-us...

RZuo (talk) 21:26, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

We need someone to maintain CropTool

It would appear that CropTool is once again broken to the point of unusability. The person who got it working again in February 2024 did not take on responsibility to maintain it over time, which is of course their prerogative. We really need someone to maintain this quite valuable tool. - Jmabel ! talk 17:58, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

I hope this comes across without any challenging or derisive tone, Jmabel, but I have no idea what you're talking about. I've used CropTool hundreds of times and very rarely had any problems. I've used it in the past 48 hours. What kinds of issues are you experiencing? Is this a browser thing? —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 18:10, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

@Koavf: A variety of issues, ranging from not getting it to load the image at all to going all through the process and not having it saved. I literally cannot remember the last time it worked for a rotate-and-crop (not counting a multiple of 90°), but it's been months. After half a dozen times in a row that it didn't work for me a couple of weeks ago, I've just switched to download, use GIMP, upload. We keep getting reports here and the VP (etc.) that it isn't working, and you are actually the first I've heard from in a month saying that is not a 100% experience; I'm actually a bit surprised to hear it is sometimes working. - Jmabel ! talk 20:12, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

I don't use it very often, but I've used CropTool a few hundred times in the last year and never noticed any issue. However, most times I don't rotate the image. Pere prlpz (talk) 20:34, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

For rotations, I just use a little tool to request User:Rotatebot make the change. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 21:13, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

Unless I'm mistaken, Rotatebot will only do multiples of 90°; it will not do (for example) a 1.27° rotation and corresponding crop, nor do I readily see how anyone could know that is exactly what they want without a visual tool. - Jmabel ! talk 22:25, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

It can do rotations down to 1 degree. From the tool I have:

If you request a rotation by 90, 180 or 270° Rotatebot will do this in a few hours. If you request a rotation by any other angle it will probably take longer.

So as long as you can translate whatever you want into 360 degrees, then you should be good. (I should also point out that I've never asked for a rotation other than 90/180/270.) Again, I don't want to downplay if you or anyone else is having problems, but between CropTool cropping and the RotateLink gadget, I don't see the immediate issues. Agreed that long-term maintenance is certainly highly important tho, as these tools will break somewhere down the line. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 22:36, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

For the record, I tried the CropTool again, since several people above said it was working. I started from a 4000 x 6000 px image already on Commons. The tool spent somewhere upwards of 30 seconds failing to fetch the image, then prompted me again for a URL. Repeated twice, at which point I'm comfortable in saying it is still broken for me. - Jmabel ! talk 03:34, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

I just tried to crop and rotate and image and it worked: File:Edifici Catalana Occidente (cropped).jpg. Maybe I was just lucky or maybe there is a problem related with the image you tried, your configuration or your equipment. What file did you try to crop?--Pere prlpz (talk) 08:43, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

I think mere corp is more likely to fail for larger file sizes and during busier hours. Other features are completely broken. Enhancing999 (talk) 09:13, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

Recently I've been unable to overwrite using CropTool, getting the error "The overwrite option is disabled because this is a multipage file", for example when trying to crop File:Galerius Arch (Thessaloniki).jpg. I've never seen this error until recently. It seems to work correctly when saving a new file. Consigned (talk) 18:03, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

Occasionally, I get that message (for single page files or files with a blank second page), but it still overwrites. Enhancing999 (talk) 18:06, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

Now I got what I think may be the same error as you. When trying to rotate 270º (without cropping) file:Diagonal 441 - Muntaner 223-225 - 20240618 173626.jpg, I got "[Error] undefined". Cropping the same image without rotating seems to work fine.--Pere prlpz (talk) 22:06, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

Distributed_by

See: File:Onorio Moretti (1881-1939) obituary in The Boston Globe of Boston, Massachusetts on October 24, 1939.jpg in the structured data. I want to allow Distributed_by to be used in structured_data. AP UPI news articles are distributed to news outlets. Recordings and movies have distribution companies involved. I tried to make a change at Distributed_by but it did not work. RAN (talk) 15:05, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

• What I am looking for is to allow distributed_by in structured data. --RAN (talk) 20:00, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

Voting to ratify the Wikimedia Movement Charter is ending soon

You can find this message translated into additional languages on Meta-wiki. Please help translate to your language

Hello everyone,

This is a kind reminder that the voting period to ratify the Wikimedia Movement Charter will be closed on July 9, 2024, at 23:59 UTC.

If you have not voted yet, please vote on SecurePoll.

On behalf of the Charter Electoral Commission,

RamzyM (WMF) 03:45, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

Identifying and categorising special building in Japan

This building is just outside de Category:Hakata Station main station. It has green plants and even a waterfall.

Smiley.toerist (talk) 11:37, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

It’s the Miyako Hotel, Hakata, at (33.58977,130.42283). Dogfennydd (talk) 17:22, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

@Dogfennydd@Smiley.toerist done categorizing! It is a very good thing that Japanese copyright law does allow commercial uses of images of their architecture. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contrib's.) 00:42, 9 July 2024 (UTC)

Long term preservation of media files

In relation to the point Long-term structured digital preservation of humanity's media that has been included here, I'd like to comment on a general idea. I know that it isn't feasible at the moment, but I think about it as a wish (or dream) for the future. There are new very promising storage technologies in development, that will be great for very long term data storage. Once they are available at an affordable cost, many people or institutions will use them to ensure their data is never lost. But what data deserves that more than... human knowledge put together? This goes beyond Commons: all Wikimedia text dumps should also be included there. Text dumps are currently "only" about 25 TB in size (even if including last 5 versions; each one of them covers full history for all Wiki pages). All media files in Commons are currently 543.48 TB in all. 5D optical data storage disks could store up to 360 TB of data, so 2 of them could store all Commons media files, plus full text history of all wiki pages from all Wikimedia sites (including Commons itself). I don't know when it will become affordable, but, once it is, I think is absolutely desirable that WMF produces, each year or each few years, those 2 (or 3 or 4, no more should be needed, even if total size grows a lot) disks of human knowledge. Each pair/group of disks could be stored in different places, so very long term preservation of all content is ensured. If cost ends up being really low, its use can also be very promising for Internet Archive, so the earthquake risk for its contents (that I have expressed several times, both here and in Wikipedia village pump, and even at their own forum) would be virtually eliminated. MGeog2022 (talk) 13:04, 6 July 2024 (UTC)

It is very important to think about how human knowledge and documents of it can outlast many Millennia. Right now, there are several researches going on, which media might be the best for storing many hundreds of terabytes of data like "Project Silica" or "Cerabyte". Researching takes a lot time until respective storage media is available for the market. For writing and using the said 5D medium, we need a machine with a femtosecond laser, which is very uncommon. We need storage media where writing and reading will also be possible in the far future. Preserving data amounts under 1 PB isn't that expensive and can be assured easily. Next to classic HDDs, files could also be stored on LTO tapes, which are rather cheap and are good for archiving. Apart from this, we need distributed archiving and redundancies, and storage media that is not exposed to (human) failures and errors, or malware, or other threats. But as storage medisa gets better from year to year, we already are to store many many Petabytes on small space (the Internet Archive has a high storage density with its petabox). And in theory, you would need only fourty 26 TB HDDs for one petabyte, which fit in any (smaller) room. :) --PantheraLeo1359531 😺 (talk) 14:21, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

But the biggest problems are errors made by human users, disasters, wars, and people who don't think about or don't care about archiving their works (photos or videos of events etc.) they created. --PantheraLeo1359531 😺 (talk) 14:22, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

Another problem is how organisations like Internet Archive or Google, or Meta or whoever cares about preservation. The Internet Archive stores very many petabytes that have to be managed and to be maintained. Companies like Meta or Google hold high relevant files (look at images contributed to Google Maps; many people use Instagram to post relevant scenes) alive. What happens after their liquidation? How are their files treated and how to handle issues like copyright and privacy? What about archives of administrations, of towns, of newspapers, etc. pp... Many questions, but unfortunately too few answers. --PantheraLeo1359531 😺 (talk) 14:27, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

According to the Wikipedia article about 5D optical data storage, it was used in 2018 to store a copy of Isaac Asimov's Foundation trilogy. That made me think that it was a matter of time (let's say 15-20 years, for example) for it to be available at an affordable cost to WMF. Of course there are lots of storage technologies available; the point with 5D storage is that the same physical disc could last for (theoretically) billions of years, so, once a backup is created, it needs no further maintenance. Well, up until 2021, there were no true backups of Wikimedia Commons media files (only several production copies); now, there are backups in both 2 main WMF datacenters. Before 2013 or so, there was only 1 main WMF datacenter (no copies or backups outside of it). I've read about plans to also implement offline backups that can provide even bigger security. Being optimistic, if the vast majority of files survived for many years when there weren't even proper backups (and even when all copies were at the same datacenter), they are much more likely to survive now that they are backuped following established standards. When the day arrives that high capacity media with an indefinite lifetime is available, it would be great to also write those backups to such media, but probably it isn't strictly needed, since well-maintained, frequent backups would in fact get almost the same level of security.

By the way, I think it is worth publicly recognizing the work by Jaime Crespo of WMF, in backups, and particularly media backups. They were an absolute need, and it seems that almost all work was made by him; it's really great.

What about archives of administrations, of towns, of newspapers: this is a complex issue. Data that enters public domain can be uploaded to Internet Archive, or, if applicable, to Commons. Governments of all levels should take care of their historical data, and eventually, to have a kind of world central repository, most of it could also end up in Archive or, in some cases, Commons. Archives of important newspapers are usually well-kept, and, if they enter public domain, could also be centralized in Internet Archive or a similar site.

Internet Archive or Google, or Meta: Google and Meta have enough money to store an enormous size of data, but their purpose is to monetize it, not to preserve it indefinitely. On the other hand, Internet Archive's problem is the combination of its small budget with the really big amount of data that it stores, probably along with some wrong decisions they have made. MGeog2022 (talk) 20:27, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

Sorry if I am trying to go too far too soon: thinking more about reality and less about dreams :-), probably the suggestion I should make is to implement offline backups (for example, on tape), if there are no immediate plans for it just now. MGeog2022 (talk) 20:38, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

For me, talking about these topics and possible scenarios is interesting, and worth to discuss :) --PantheraLeo1359531 😺 (talk) 06:44, 9 July 2024 (UTC)

• Watch some of the videos on Iron Mountain, Boyers, Pennsylvania facility storing digital and physical media, and Granite Mountain Records Vault and compare to 2008 Universal Studios fire original master recordings; and w:Double Fold where archives discard/sell original material after microfilming. --RAN (talk) 15:15, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

U4C Special Election - Call for Candidates

You can find this message translated into additional languages on Meta-wiki. Please help translate to your language

Hello all,

A special election has been called to fill additional vacancies on the U4C. The call for candidates phase is open from now through July 19, 2024.

The Universal Code of Conduct Coordinating Committee (U4C) is a global group dedicated to providing an equitable and consistent implementation of the UCoC. Community members are invited to submit their applications in the special election for the U4C. For more information and the responsibilities of the U4C, please review the U4C Charter.

In this special election, according to chapter 2 of the U4C charter, there are 9 seats available on the U4C: four community-at-large seats and five regional seats to ensure the U4C represents the diversity of the movement. No more than two members of the U4C can be elected from the same home wiki. Therefore, candidates must not have English Wikipedia, German Wikipedia, or Italian Wikipedia as their home wiki.

Read more and submit your application on Meta-wiki.

In cooperation with the U4C,

-- Keegan (WMF) (talk) 00:02, 10 July 2024 (UTC)

Negative boosted AI images

Should Template:Negative boosted template be added to Template:AI upscaled and Template:PD-algorithm? You could argue that most people who are using Commons would rather prefer to find non-AI images when using the search function.--Trade (talk) 21:04, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

It depends on the subject, for some subjects (and not only AI-specific ones) some AI images are the most relevant, especially when it comes to recent art genres. It's more the quality of the image that matters than how it was created. There may not be very many cases of such but I oppose it being added to PD-algorithm. I'd support it being added to items in Category:AI misgeneration. Prototyperspective (talk) 21:30, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

For actively bad images it would make sense to also include the supercategory of Category:Poor quality AI-generated images, which can look superficially useful as a thumbnail but have some fundamental error at full size. Belbury (talk) 13:22, 9 July 2024 (UTC)

(Wrt Template:AI upscaled) Overwriting images with upscaled versions (whether with AI or otherwise) is against Commons policy. Should these edits not be reverted? ReneeWrites (talk) 23:00, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

Commons is chock full of improperly overwritten files. The way the regulars talk about it here on VP, you would think something's being done, but not really. RadioKAOS / Talk to me, Billy / Transmissions 00:04, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

In fairness that's why COM:RFR was created. I don't know how effective it is in curbing destructive overwritings but it's not like there have been no attempts. The issue is that judging by what pages the template links to, the vast majority of these upscalings were done by an experienced Commons user. I assume this was a blind spot for them and they're just not aware of this policy. ReneeWrites (talk) 07:10, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

@ReneeWrites: they absolutely should be reverted.

@RadioKAOS: I certainly revert these on sight, unless it is genuinely own work by the uploader and they make that decision themselves to overwrite. - Jmabel ! talk 02:41, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

The template is to flag that an image may contain speculative AI-hallucinated content, not that the Commons image has been overwritten. Most AI-upscaled images are uploaded as separate files (sometimes, frustratingly, instead of the original, where a user pulling historical photos from old newspapers thinks they look better with the AI treatment). Belbury (talk) 10:57, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

"You could argue that most people who are using Commons would rather prefer to find non-AI images" We can argue lots of things of course, but is this actually the case ... I'd avoid this kind of reasoning, we do not know why people look for the things they look for. Better to make actual judgements on proper arguments. The negative boosted template is a pretty aggressive downrank (similar to that which deletions get) which I would not advise using for anything but literal trash, and thus I would not advise in this case. If it should be downranked with a different value is something that I'd be open to (based on arguments), but we would have to define and add extra levels of derank templates for that to work. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 14:33, 9 July 2024 (UTC)

Some Commons users won't mind being served AI images. A number of Wikipedia projects seem very relaxed about using AI-upscaled or entirely AI-generated images for biography articles, apparently preferring them to lower-quality historical images. If I myself was looking for a drawing or an icon I wouldn't dismiss an AI-generated image out of hand.

But there is definitely an issue where a user may find it hard to distinguish real photographs from artificial ones, when searching. Right now, a search for "astronaut" is okay for the early results being a mix of photos and cartoony artwork - the photos are all (I think!) genuine, the cartoons are either AI or hand-drawn. There's nothing misleading there. But a search for "london steam train" has a completely fake AI image in the first few results, which only becomes apparent if you click through or hover to read the filenames. Belbury (talk) 13:01, 10 July 2024 (UTC)

Good points, in your second link the problem is mitigated to some extent by the good file naming so when hovering over the AI image one sees a tooltip over it and the URL in the bottom left with "AI-generated" in the title (even when at VP/Proposals many have opposed a policy guideline for descriptive file naming). I think the best approach would be to have a tag in a corner of the thumbnail image that clarifies the image is entirely/largely made using some AI tool, and so even when glancing over the search results. Prototyperspective (talk) 20:09, 10 July 2024 (UTC)

Does Pywikibot still work?

Yesterday I have uploaded File:Brückner Vielflache Fig. 42.jpg using Pywikibot. After one image I have stopped the script, to fix a detail in the description. But since then I was not able to upload the other images. The main error messages are An error occurred for uri https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/api.php and The write operation timed out.

all error messages

Uploading file to commons:commons... Sleeping for 7.3 seconds, 2024-07-10 17:23:06 ERROR: An error occurred for uri https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/api.php ERROR: Traceback (most recent call last): File "/home/PATH/env/lib/python3.12/site-packages/pywikibot/data/api/_requests.py", line 684, in _http_request response = http.request(self.site, uri=uri, ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ File "/home/PATH/env/lib/python3.12/site-packages/pywikibot/comms/http.py", line 283, in request r = fetch(baseuri, headers=headers, **kwargs) ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ File "/home/PATH/env/lib/python3.12/site-packages/pywikibot/comms/http.py", line 457, in fetch callback(response) File "/home/PATH/env/lib/python3.12/site-packages/pywikibot/comms/http.py", line 343, in error_handling_callback raise response from None File "/home/PATH/env/lib/python3.12/site-packages/pywikibot/comms/http.py", line 448, in fetch response = session.request(method, uri, ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ File "/home/PATH/env/lib/python3.12/site-packages/requests/sessions.py", line 589, in request resp = self.send(prep, **send_kwargs) ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ File "/home/PATH/env/lib/python3.12/site-packages/requests/sessions.py", line 703, in send r = adapter.send(request, **kwargs) ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ File "/home/PATH/env/lib/python3.12/site-packages/requests/adapters.py", line 501, in send raise ConnectionError(err, request=request) requests.exceptions.ConnectionError: ('Connection aborted.', TimeoutError('The write operation timed out')) WARNING: Waiting 5.0 seconds before retrying.

Was something changed yesterday? My script is the same that has worked for the one uploaded file. --Watchduck (quack) 15:42, 10 July 2024 (UTC)

I have succesfully uploaded photo today. If you dont already do try to use asynchronous=True for upload. If that doesn't help try to set socket_timeout for wikibot. ie.

pywikibot.config.socket_timeout = 120
site = pywikibot.Site("commons", "commons")  # for Wikimedia Commons
site.login()
image_file_path='/tmp/example.jpg'
commons_file_name = "File:example.jpg"
file_page = pywikibot.FilePage(site, commons_file_name)
if file_page.exists():
        print(f"The file {commons_file_name} exists.")
        exit()
file_page.text = wikitext
summary = "Uploading example.jpg"
file_page.upload(image_file_path, comment=comment,asynchronous=True)

--Zache (talk) 16:48, 10 July 2024 (UTC)

pywikibot.config.socket_timeout = 120 worked. Thanks. --Watchduck (quack) 17:02, 10 July 2024 (UTC)

I'm unable to use the image I just uploaded.

Hi I don't seem to be able to use the file https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:M_F_Gervais_Holy_Roman_Empire.pdf It show up in Commons but in Wikipedia I'm not able to use it. Why? It happened for my last file and someone 'did' something... I don't know what was done but it worked. What should I do to fix it? — Preceding unsigned comment added by M F Gervais (talk • contribs) 18:45, 31 May 2024 (UTC)

@M F Gervais: It is there and it functional however due to how big and unwieldy it is as a pdf it takes a while to render, especially whern it has to develop the image cache first:

Now because PDFs are typically multipage document it can need extra formatting if you are trying to do it through standard wiki formatting. mw:help:images. PDFs should not be used if you want to display an image, please upload an image file per Com:File types — Preceding unsigned comment added by Billinghurst (talk • contribs) 07:59, 1 June 2024‎ (UTC)

This section was archived on a request by: --Contributor2020^{Talk to me here!} 06:18, 17 July 2024 (UTC)

License template request: AGPLv3 only

Could someone create the license template Template:AGPLv3 only? We currently only have Template:AGPL, and that's not acceptable for files that don't use the "or any later version" clause.

We already have Template:GPLv3 only, which makes this distinguishment for Template:GPLv3.

I'd create the template myself, as I've recently uploaded an AGPLv3-only file, but I have zero experience with template creation and wouldn't even know where to start.

It also occurred to me that there might be some files incorrectly marked as AGPL, since the correct license tag doesn't exist and apparently never has, so the logical step for the lazy is to just use the AGPL template and be done with the upload (which I'll also do, though I'll change the license to the correct one once someone creates the template).

Dunno if this helps, but the Wikidata ID for AGPLv3 (ie. AGPLv3 only) is GNU Affero General Public License, version 3.0 (Q27017232) and AGPLv3 (containing the "any later version" clause) is GNU Affero General Public License, version 3.0 or later (Q27020062). --Veikk0.ma (talk) 01:25, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

I've created Template:AGPLv3 only, but I'm waiting for a translation admin to mark Template:AGPLv3 only/i18n for translation. I might have done something wrong with the i18n stuff so if a more experienced user/translation admin can check that would be wonderful. —Matrix(!) {user - talk? - _uselesscontributions} 10:25, 9 July 2024 (UTC)

@Veikk0.ma:  Done, see Template:AGPLv3 only, you can use/translate it now. —Matrix(!) {user - talk? - _uselesscontributions} 17:11, 11 July 2024 (UTC)

Many thanks! --Veikk0.ma (talk) 00:00, 12 July 2024 (UTC)

"campaign323@ISA"

Does anyone know the significance of "campaign323@ISA"? I am seeing a lot of bad "depicts" with that as an edit summary. - Jmabel ! talk 01:59, 12 July 2024 (UTC)

ISO 24138 - International Standard Content Code - ISCC

What is the position of Commons on the International Standard Content Code (ISCC - ISO 24138) https://iscc.io/ ?

As neither the english-languaae Wikipedia nor the german-language Wikipedia have an article on ISCC, don't mention it in the ISCC-disambiguation page and do not even mention it anywhere, I fear, that there is no postion about ISCC at Commons? @Legoktm: --C.Suthorn (@Life_is@no-pony.farm - p7.ee/p) (talk) 10:30, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

I wasn't aware of ISCC up until now. Was there a specific reason you pinged me? Legoktm (talk) 02:20, 9 July 2024 (UTC)

Yes, someone tagged you about ISCC on Mastodon a few days ago (in connection with an annocement about ISCC and the expressed hope that Commons would use it). C.Suthorn (@Life_is@no-pony.farm - p7.ee/p) (talk) 02:33, 10 July 2024 (UTC)

How about adding a SDC prop for ISCC? --C.Suthorn (@Life_is@no-pony.farm - p7.ee/p) (talk) 10:31, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

It seems like this is a fancy version of perceptual hashing. (More specifically, it is a combination of 4 hashes - a (similarity) hash of the metadata, a perceptual hash of content, a semantic hash of content, and a cryptographic hash of content). According to one of their press releases it will help track the profiliation of AI fakes, but i have no idea how that would work and sounds like trendy buzz word BS. I guess it might be useful to include it on commons if it becomes a widely used standard (The same way SHA1 hashes of images are useful) and it has some applications to finding similar images. I guess the intention is to easily compare the content on different repositories to find both duplicates and near-duplicate media. I imagine ideally such hashes would be generated automatically and not simply a prop in SDC that users fill out since its a hash and not subjective. Bawolff (talk) 07:34, 12 July 2024 (UTC)

Template for Most Valued Image Closure on COM:VIC

Hello everyone. Often, I have taken 15-20 minutes to close a single Most Valued Image Closure on COM:VIC since it doesn't have an existing template and we have to keep our eyes wide open as scope for mistakes are much wide open when we approach this type of closure. Hence, for a long period of time, I am trying to create a template which could do the work so. However, given I have not much expertise in template building, I couldn't be able to do so. However, what I think is I have created a very, very raw template which still cannot do things as expected, but is a start. If anybody can help, it will save much time for our fellow volunteers hoping to close MVRs. (feel free to express your criticisms about the template, I admit it is the trashiest draft ever made. It would be much highly appreciated if you can also create an entirely new template.)
I request you to refer to COM:VICL on what are the current conditions on closing a Most Valued Image Closure.
Thanks in advance, Contributor2020^{Talk to me here!} 16:10, 12 July 2024 (UTC)

Subcats not displaying (templates)

Category:Physics in the 2020s does not show the subcats for the recent years like Category:2023 in physics despite that these have been created long ago and that I tried ?action=purge on both pages. Templates are used for these categories. Why do they still not show up and how to get this problem fixed? I've also seen this problem elsewhere but usually it went away after purging the page or editing it or on its own a few days after the template categories/category has been changed. Prototyperspective (talk) 10:29, 18 July 2024 (UTC)

@Prototyperspective: It was a template issue. It's been fixed now and the categories show up again. ReneeWrites (talk) 17:34, 18 July 2024 (UTC)

This section is resolved and can be archived. If you disagree, replace this template with your comment. --Prototyperspective (talk) 17:41, 18 July 2024 (UTC)

Ok thanks, I don't know what the problem was (and this happened before) but it's solved now. Prototyperspective (talk) 17:41, 18 July 2024 (UTC)

Potentially confusing page naming

We have both Commons:Primeiros passos and Commons:First steps/pt with the level-1 heading "Primeiros passos". This seems potentially very confusing. Any thoughts? - Jmabel ! talk 18:26, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

Easy, like it or not, English is the default language for the project. It's a pragmatic decision, and obviously assists search. Other languages can be echoed by creating a companion page in Wikidata. Broichmore (talk) 19:10, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

@Broichmore: one of us is missing the other's point; I'm not sure which. For Portuguese-language users, this results in two rather different pages that effectively have the same title. Are you saying that's not at all a problem, or not one worth fixing, or something else? And I can't see what Wikidata has to do with the matter at all. - Jmabel ! talk 00:09, 9 July 2024 (UTC)

Yes, I missed the point. The two pages should, could be, amalgamated TBH. Broichmore (talk) 10:00, 9 July 2024 (UTC)

On closer look, this seems to be a problem also for Commons:First_steps/de and Commons:Erste Schritte and around 20-30 more languages (everything in {{Header|Lang-FS}}) as a lot of these translations were created pre-2010 before we had mw:Extension:Translate. Ideally, they should be redirected to the correct version (Commons:First steps/xx) (the versions are so different there's little point merging). —Matrix(!) {user - talk? - _uselesscontributions} 10:34, 9 July 2024 (UTC)

But that seems to raise the question of whether Commons:Primeiros passos, Commons:Erste Schritte, etc. have some content worth preserving.

I'd suggest that some people whose native language is other than English might want to look into this for their respective native language. - Jmabel ! talk 16:54, 9 July 2024 (UTC)

There is also the question whether these pages should be translations from an original in English or edited freely by the community. Should the "content worth preserving" be translated and added to the English version or added to the translated page in pt/de/…? What about things that are especially relevant for many speakers of the other language, such as references to local law or clarifications generally not needed for the Anglosphere? –LPfi (talk) 19:51, 13 July 2024 (UTC)

Potential copyright problem -- best course of action?

(Discussion moved to right place) Any guidance appreciated. --Rlandmann (talk) 10:13, 13 July 2024 (UTC)

Good luck with it, but this is the page you should be on, with this. Broichmore (talk) 19:47, 13 July 2024 (UTC)

Many thanks; I'll move it. --Rlandmann (talk) 22:52, 13 July 2024 (UTC)

File:Baron Moncheur, F.R. Coudert, W.D. Robbins LCCN2014719398.jpg

At File:Baron Moncheur, F.R. Coudert, W.D. Robbins LCCN2014719398.jpg I get the hidden category when I use {{taken on|August 21, 1917}} but I do not get it when I switch to {{taken on|1917-08-21|location=United States}}. I need the country because there are other countries in the August 21, 1917 category. How do I make the category hidden, like the others? --RAN (talk) 14:24, 13 July 2024 (UTC)

You can create the category page with the same content as the category for the day before. --Geohakkeri (talk) 15:51, 13 July 2024 (UTC)

Commons talk:Media knowledge beyond Wikipedia

I've added a new response at the bottom of this talk page, maybe it can be worth reading and/or commenting on it if you want. MGeog2022 (talk) 17:50, 14 July 2024 (UTC)

Photo challenge May results

Pets: Entries • Votes • Scores

Rank	1	2	3
image
Title	Australian Shepherd Dog	Hachi and Boy	Cat enjoying the sun between daisies
Author	Ermell	HachiBoy	Lusi Lindwurm
Score	27	15	13

Waves: Entries • Votes • Scores

Rank	1	2	3
image
Title	This was shot in Kakinada Beach, shows struggle of fishermen in middle of sea	A wave painted with a white neon lamp in a flashlight, city beach in Płock, Poland.	Port Saint-Michel in Batz-sur-Mer
Author	Zahed.zk	Lightpainterplock	Ibex73
Score	28	19	11

Congratulations to Ermell, HachiBoy, Lusi Lindwurm, Zahed.zk, Lightpainterplock and Ibex73. -- Jarekt (talk) 01:19, 15 July 2024 (UTC)

Alphabetical string function

Does anyone know of a template or module which would allow me to give it two strings and simply return the one that comes first alphabetically (perhaps with a switch to choose between ascending or descending order)? Josh (talk) 22:24, 18 July 2024 (UTC)

@Joshbaumgartner: you didn't mention an example application or your level of lua knowledge. {{Sort list}} will kind of do what you need, I am not sure how to only return the first element though. Commander Keane (talk) 12:31, 19 July 2024 (UTC)

@Commander Keane I am guessing from your response that this isn't something that already exists out there. My Lua knowledge is really nothing to be honest. I've dabbled in tweaking some but with meh results. en:Template:Min does exactly what I want, except that it only works for numbers, and I want to feed it strings. I'm developing a template that will determine a target category name based on various elements, but in some cases the order of the words in the category name are alphabetical. For example, if it has 'children' and 'adult humans', the correct target would be 'adult humans with children', not 'children with adult humans'. Thus, I want a function that allows the template to quickly know which of those two should come first when forming the phrase. Here is my ideal input and output for this case:

• {{Str min|1=children|2=adult humans}} --> adult humans

{{Sort list}} is not useful for this as it returns all of values in a list format. It also requires some unfortunate formatting on the input side as well. I could do a lot of pre-formatting to create the input it needs and then a lot of formatting on the back end to strip it back down to what I need, but that seems like a lot of code to shoehorn in a function that wasn't really intended for purpose. That said, I looked at that before posting here to see if I could maybe modify it, but unfortunately my lack of Lua skills made that effort a failure. I assume for an actual Lua user, it is probably child's play. Josh (talk) 15:29, 19 July 2024 (UTC)

@Joshbaumgartner I'm currently learning C++ and Python languages, and cannot focus on Lua. I will be writing a Python script on that alphabetical string function at Wikifunctions. Anyone can convert it into Lua if necessary. Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs • uploads) 18:19, 19 July 2024 (UTC)

Finally created the Python function at Z18069. Anyone with a skill in Lua can convert it into the desired language. Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs • uploads) 18:44, 19 July 2024 (UTC)

I have tried to do it myself at Module:Two strings to alphabetically first string but failed. Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs • uploads) 19:04, 19 July 2024 (UTC)

{{#invoke:Two strings to alphabetically first string|main|children|adult humans}} —> adult humans --Geohakkeri (talk) 21:49, 19 July 2024 (UTC)

Thank you for implementing the function in Lua. @Joshbaumgartner use this module. Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs • uploads) 02:48, 20 July 2024 (UTC)

Thanks, both of you. Those little things catch me when I try and dabble and I don't know enough to fix them. I'm not sure what 'main' does, but I know it works now. I was testing it while you posted this. Josh (talk) 02:53, 20 July 2024 (UTC)

@Commander Keane, @Sbb1413, @Geohakkeri: Thanks for all of the input, it looks like Geohakkeri got it working. I've created {{Str min}} which invokes the module Sbb1413 and Geohakkeri worked on. Josh (talk) 02:51, 20 July 2024 (UTC)

This section was archived on a request by: Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs • uploads) 03:32, 20 July 2024 (UTC)

Category:2024 shooting at a Donald Trump rally

Any protests if i move this to "2024 assassination attempt of Donald Trump"?--Trade (talk) 02:16, 14 July 2024 (UTC)

Why is it necessary to specify the year? Were there previous assassination attempts on President Trump? Elizium23 (talk) 02:24, 14 July 2024 (UTC)

It's not necessary at all Trade (talk) 02:29, 14 July 2024 (UTC)

Perhaps it is too soon, and things are changing rapidly enough. The category name, as it is, isn't inaccurate, so I'm in no hurry to change it. There is still significant variance in the article names in different languages, and there is certainly a large discussion on enwiki to change the name of the main article, as well. Elizium23 (talk) 02:33, 14 July 2024 (UTC)

It could be useful to see at one glance when an assassination attempt took place --PantheraLeo1359531 😺 (talk) 10:24, 14 July 2024 (UTC)

It is now at Category:Attempted assassination of Donald Trump in case anyone was interested. Commander Keane (talk) 01:41, 15 July 2024 (UTC)

• Why was the redirect deleted, it appeared useful. --RAN (talk) 03:32, 15 July 2024 (UTC)

  Would support --PantheraLeo1359531 😺 (talk) 07:24, 15 July 2024 (UTC)

New version of the upload wizard doesn't seem to collect enough licencing information

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T370049

I took a CC-BY-SA photo from Commons File:Craignish Rainbow.jpg and cropped it to focus on the landscape rather than the sky which I uploaded as File:Craignish_Landscape,_2017.jpg. OK, there is no problem for me to do this given the original work was CC-BY-SA. But when I was in the licensing screen in the upload wizard, I was able to tick a box to say that I was uploading a work that contained the work of others and that it was a licence accepted on Commons, but nowhere on that screen did I get to say what/where the source was. Surely for both the purposes of licence checking and attribution, I needed to identify the original image. Previously there was a box called (I think) "source" where I would previously have written like "Crop of File:Craignish Rainbow.jpg" enabling the licence to be checked and attributing the original creator of the image. When I came to the next screen (where you name it, describe it, categorise it, etc), I added the "Crop of ..." into the "Other information" box. OK, I think I've done my best to do the right thing by the original creator of the work by doing this, but I feel that most people won't think about doing that without being prompting and, as it relates to licensing, I should it should form part of the previous screen. I think after ticking the box saying it contains the work of others, there should be question(s) to identify what works of others are involved and their licencing. Or am I missing something? Kerry Raymond (talk) 02:31, 14 July 2024 (UTC)

Pinging @Sannita (WMF). - Jmabel ! talk 05:20, 14 July 2024 (UTC)

@Kerry Raymond Thanks for the thorough report. I'll open a Phab ticket about it, and see that we address it at the next meeting available. Sannita (WMF) (talk) 08:55, 15 July 2024 (UTC)

Category:Charles Darwin

At Category:Charles Darwin we have a family tree. People with Commons Categories get a blue link. But, Josiah Wedgwood does not get a blue link even though he has a category. When I click on the Wikidata link to see why, it takes me to the Russian language version for Josiah Wedgwood at Wikidata. Can anyone figure out why one entry is doing this incorrectly but the others work fine. The template for the family tree was imported from the Russian Wikipedia a few years ago. --RAN (talk) 16:49, 14 July 2024 (UTC)

The Russian thing was an easy fix. --Geohakkeri (talk) 17:03, 14 July 2024 (UTC)

• What was the secret? And why still no blue link to the category? --RAN (talk) 03:31, 15 July 2024 (UTC)

STL files visualization

Hi all, for the past few weeks, I haven't been able to view STL files that are uploaded to Commons (for example these: Category:STL files from Museo di storia naturale dell'Università di Pisa). The thumbnail shows up fine, but when I click on the eye icon, I get an error message, that reads "Sorry, the file Undefined cannot be displayed since it is not present on the current page. Go to the corresponding file page". The last sentence is a link, but leads to a non-existent "Undefined" page. Up until a few weeks ago, a window would open with the 3D image, which I could rotate and view. Any idea what's going on? Thanks a lot! --Marta Arosio (WMIT) (talk) 12:20, 12 July 2024 (UTC)

Yes, unfortunately, the 3D functionality on Commons is not very well curated. A requested feature to be able to upload textured meshes is also stuck for years now. We as community hope that these issues will be adressed, but until now, nothing huge happened :( --PantheraLeo1359531 😺 (talk) 14:05, 12 July 2024 (UTC)

Created the issue a few weeks ago here

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T368301

Prototyperspective (talk) 14:46, 12 July 2024 (UTC)

Thanks @Prototyperspective: ; I am noting now that the 3d rotation is indeed still accessible, if you click on the miniature within a Wikipedia article. The page that opens then presents the image that can be rotated. This does not work clicking on the same miniature on Wikidata. For an example, see this file File:Panthera pardus 3d scan Natural History Museum University of Pisa C 1389.stl on this article w:Leopard. --Marta Arosio (WMIT) (talk) 09:34, 16 July 2024 (UTC)

Thanks, didn't know STL files still work on Wikipedia. I'll add this info to the code issue. The file does open and rotate on Wikidata on my side so maybe that got fixed since your comment or there is some issue in your browser. Prototyperspective (talk) 11:12, 16 July 2024 (UTC)

Deletion nominations using only no-fop as reason

Example: Porta Susa old station building 2016 4 This is the old station of 1856, not the New one. So some explanation as to why this building is protected is needed. The same for the nummers 1 to 3. Smiley.toerist (talk) 07:23, 13 July 2024 (UTC)

Courtesy links:

• File:Porta Susa old station building 2016 4.jpg, and
• Commons:Deletion requests/File:Porta Susa old station building 2016 4.jpg.

Commander Keane (talk) 10:19, 13 July 2024 (UTC)

From the perspective of the deletion nominator, Template:NoFoP-Italy says This image features an architectural or artistic work, photographed from a public space in Italy, which is true for the deleted picture... Maybe it should make it clearer with something like This image features a recent architectural or artistic work, photographed from a public space in Italy. Maybe User:Mazbel can shed some light on the error. Commander Keane (talk) 10:35, 13 July 2024 (UTC)

@Commander Keane@Smiley.toerist anything in public domain is PD. Free to be licensed under commercial CC licensing. Italy is a Berne signatory, and current Berne Convention rules prohibit copyright renewals (reflected in the 1940s copyright law of Italy that is the law in force today), so it is unlikely the architect's grandchildren can claim copyright over a work that has fallen into PD. Those DRs must be closed as keep. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contrib's.) 10:45, 13 July 2024 (UTC)

@Commander Keane: Regarding what I was tagged, when it came to nominating it to DR, I relied on the template description as mentioned above, being a work of architecture. Thus, the error can be attributed to the unclear text you quoted at the beginning. On the other hand, (correct me if I misinterpreted), did the second quote correspond to a suggestion to change the text of the template? Finally, as JWilz12345 makes explicit, grandchildren are unlikely to claim copyright to a work that has already fallen into the category of PD.--Mazbel (Talk) 03:11, 14 July 2024 (UTC)

@Mazbel was that template tagged at those four images? If so, that tag should be removed from the said images. You may want to replace it with {{PD-old-architecture}} (only for PD buildings in no-FoP countries). JWilz12345 (Talk|Contrib's.) 03:14, 14 July 2024 (UTC)

@Mazbel, the second quote suggested adding "a recent" to the template description, possibly linking to PD-old may be good. Commander Keane (talk) 03:17, 14 July 2024 (UTC)

@JWilz12345: Hmm if you refer directly to the image file, the {{NoFoP-Italy}} template is not present, only in the DR. However, it is good to add the {{PD-old-architecture}} template to those photos, to avoid future mistakes. @Commander Keane: Yes, I think it would be good to open some discussion on that. Maybe with that small change, it would avoid inconveniences like the above. Greetings to both of you! --Mazbel (Talk) 03:27, 14 July 2024 (UTC)

@Mazbel When you make such DRs, could you also please add the relevant category? Otherwise nobody can check your claims and the images get deleted after a week unless somebody casually notice them. Friniate (talk) 16:36, 14 July 2024 (UTC)

There are stil two delete nominations active. File:Porta Susa old station building 2016 1.jpg and File:Porta Susa old station building 2016 3.jpg.Smiley.toerist (talk) 16:04, 16 July 2024 (UTC)

License change

Hello everyone.

I recently decided to change the license of all the photographs taken by me that I have uploaded to Wikimedia Commons, which are located in this category, to the Creative Commons CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication license. Would there be a way to change the licenses for these files globally, or is it only possible individually?

Thank you in advance. P4K1T0 (talk) 20:43, 19 July 2024 (UTC)

Though it is technically relatively easy with VFC or with a bot, read Commons:License revocation, please. What you could do as the creator is adding the license tag {{cc-zero}} or as you did before {{self|cc-zero}}. I or someone else could even do it for you referring to your request here. It would be in my opinion better, though, if you’d write some lines on your user page which could then be linked in the edit comment. — Speravir – 00:20, 20 July 2024 (UTC)

I just wrote this comment on my user page. Would it be valid like that? Thank you. — P4K1T0 (talk) 09:25, 20 July 2024 (UTC)

Yes, that will do.

@Speravir: if you are following up on this, please make sure things like File:1927, La Asamblea Nacional, Alfonso Torres López.jpg are left alone. - Jmabel ! talk 15:58, 20 July 2024 (UTC)

Thank you for the pointer, Jmabel, but I intentionally wanted to edit only files with {{self|$cc license tag$}}. Also, this image is not in the category for own created photographs, but for uploaded ones. Nonetheless, there are several probably wrongly categorized images, see answer to PaKiTo. — Speravir – 01:34, 21 July 2024 (UTC)

@P4K1T0:  Done for all images containing {{self|cc-by-sa-3.0}} or {{self|cc-by-sa-4.0}} as license tag, confer as example Special:Diff/901418349. Because Presentación de «La marina cantonal» (20221019 210856).jpg is your work I’ve also edited its two extracts you’ve created, as well. But there are some images I did not edit. I think they are wrongly categorized and you should move them into Category:Photographs uploaded by P4K1T0:

• File:Altar Salud Augusteum.jpg
• File:Carlos Romero Galiana.jpg
• File:CVINK-Colonia Urbs Julia Nova Karthago.jpg
• File:Placa del busto de Asdrúbal.jpg
• File:Termas romanas Cartagena.jpg

— Speravir – 01:34, 21 July 2024 (UTC)

You shouldn't be using {{Self}} more than once on a page. The note is redundant as it is in the comment history. It should just be merged.

Couple left to be checked. Multichill (talk) 10:16, 21 July 2024 (UTC)

Thank you, Multichill for information and edits. Actually, I intended in adding a visible link to P4K1T0’s text regarding the license decision. This is not possible, now. (Edit: I solved it otherwise, e.g. Special:Diff/902262412.) I also updated the last two files that hadn’t been edited so far (but VFC had them highlighted and therefore processed, hmm). — Speravir – 22:26, 21 July 2024 (UTC)

Your request is resolved, P4K1T0, isn’t it? — Speravir – 23:05, 22 July 2024 (UTC)

I have only later noticed that Multichill did not have changed all the files, but only one as example. So I made the necessary changes just a couple of minutes ago. — Speravir – 23:47, 22 July 2024 (UTC)

Yes Speravir, my request has been satisfactorily resolved. Thank you very much for your help.--P4K1T0 (talk) 10:05, 23 July 2024 (UTC)

This section was archived on a request by: --Speravir 23:05, 22 July 2024 (UTC)

Psilota decessa -> Psilota decessum

Hopefully a super-simple issue, there's a creature - a fly species which the name spelling changed slightly from "Psilota decessa" to "Psilota decessum"

It has two wikidata files now, i think that's what's desirable on there even for such minor name differences - here the last letters of the species name only changes due to some taxonomy mumbo-jumbo [explained on wikispecies]. https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q21325248 https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q14518044

I'm unfamiliar with wikimedia commons. I think that i've changed it to revised Category:Psilota decessum, but where i think it's calling to "Wikidata Infobox" that's still reflecting the (older, wrong) Psilota decessa from it's wrong wikidata. I've tried changing some links that wikidata end, but what am i missing? In other words, I want that "Wikidata Infobox" to instead be reflecting Q14518044 Sjl197 (talk) 01:07, 16 July 2024 (UTC)

Heh-heh, "super-simple" heh-heh, famous last words!

Yes, that is indeed arcane mumbo-jumbo about a Latin language declension issue. If I'm understanding this correctly, and this is really a case of "old/deprecated/incorrect" spelling, then I'm not sure we can justify separate Wikidata items. I think we should go over there and propose a merger. It is, however, notable that they carry different taxon IDs at various sites, but hopefully those can be kept in a unified/merged item with appropriate documentation.

If we can't merge them on Wikidata then that may complicate the representation on Commons and other projects. I'd prefer a simple and straightforward process instead. Elizium23 (talk) 01:24, 16 July 2024 (UTC)

I had Latin as subject in school, and to me, it seems like the Psilota decessa looks better, as the second word complies the concord in "Kasus", "Numerus" and "Genus" --PantheraLeo1359531 😺 (talk) 11:08, 16 July 2024 (UTC)

I simply assumed that for any specialized field, be it bio-taxonomy or pharmaceuticals, the Latin language has progressed and specialized beyond its actual linguistic roots, and clearly in this case, they're applying extremely arcane and specific rules to it. (The dictionary link indeed went to wikt:decessuum, which indicates that all derivatives use macrons as well, so there are liberties taken.) Elizium23 (talk) 16:31, 16 July 2024 (UTC)

and yes, when i started looking into the issue a couple of days ago i had the view that "Psilota decessa" seemed a tolerable formation, i.e. per gender agreement between two parts, the genus as feminine and adjectival species name, but yes, biological latin is indeed a derivative, with many extra issues as due any specialist field, even worse this has several hundreds of years of baggage about all that! Sjl197 (talk) 05:07, 17 July 2024 (UTC)

@Sjl197: The correct name is P. decessa, not P. decessum. When Hutton described it in 1901, he assigned it to the genus Melanostoma. Melanostoma is neuter, so he used the neuter form of the adjective, decessum. When the species was later moved to the genus Psilota, it changed from neuter to feminine (because Psilota is feminine), and the adjective changed with it, to decessa. The invalid form Psilota decessum is a solecism used only by those who do not understand Latin. (The comment on Wikispecies, that decessum is a noun, is wrong: there is no noun with the nominative form decessum. The link there points instead to the form decessuum with two U's, which is the genitive plural form of the noun decessus. All of the changes to P. decessum should be reverted back to P. decessa. Crawdad Blues (talk) 21:24, 16 July 2024 (UTC)

Editing to add that ICZN 31.2.2, cited on the Wikispecies page, is irrelevant here, because there is no noun with the nominative form decessum that Hutton could have intended. The word must therefore be treated as an adjective. You assert in your rename requests that this word is now treated as an "invariant noun" (on whose authority? no source is cited), but if that were the case, it would be decessus, not decessum. I fear you have expended a lot of effort on a misunderstanding. Crawdad Blues (talk) 22:20, 16 July 2024 (UTC)

I think Crawdad Blues is entirely correct here. - Jmabel ! talk 04:26, 17 July 2024 (UTC)

Was @Sjl197 involved in GBIF or iNaturalist changes in some way? Because those sites are both convinced about the decessa -> decessum deprecation. GBIF deleted the taxon in 2016. iNaturalist site bears the same GBIF citation mentioned here. opentreeoflife.org doesn't seem to differentiate them too much. So other than applying a knowledge of Latin declensions (which seems sort like Original Research to me?) does anyone have a reliable secondary source, other than this GBIF thing we're looking at, which clearly documents that decessa is the preferred and modern name? Elizium23 (talk) 04:40, 17 July 2024 (UTC)

@Crawdad Blues: etc. Well, going back to start, my "super-simple" were apparently indeed famous last words! There's a lot said above Crawdad Blues to indicate good knowledge of "Biological latin" so i'm grateful, but many bold statements which i'm wary about. We agree on the early formation by Hutton, where his Melanostoma decessum does seem perfectly formed as a neuter adjective. That's how I was viewing it a couple of days ago, if so, then recombined with the feminine Psilota would indeed 'simply' give Psilota decessa. To briefly answer @Elizium23, then indeed i'm on iNat also, so involved with changes there. That was my starting point to the whole issue. To my view, there is nothing on iNat that is "convinced about the "decessa -> decessum deprecation", it's got both versions active, which cannot be, i'd only setup so decessum would be preferred, but thats on hold [1]. I wasn't involved in GBIF (where decessa was deleted in 2016), but from other things they do, then i'd say that deletion is not necessarily linked to any informed change, but may be a change in usage on one of their sources, hence I direct you to Systema Dipterorium [2] which GBIF largely takes as the authoritative catalog for that group, and their view feeds into several databases. Point is, there's a bunch of resources that seems to have shifted from "decessa" to "decessum", several done long before i've tried unifying iNaturalist to a single active name, then various Wikis - leading to this discussion.

On the actual nomenclature issue, i'm now seeing that i've misstepped on some editing of the Wikispecies. I had edited the Note: Under ICZN" etc, but i had not created that. It's the only justification i found anywhere about why "Psilota decessum" could be the form to use. Please see under the "Talk" page (same Wikispecies), for a response now from the user who created that text, which i'd modified. He also merged "Psilota decessa" -> "decessum" (also on wikispecies) back in 10 January 2023‎. I'll admit i was wrong about my edit to specify the genitive "decessuum (with two U's). He also points out same. I had misread the genitive in the wiktionary table. Before my very recent edit to that (in hindsight wrong) genitive, his previous wiktionary link was pointing instead to the accursative singular case which DOES read "decessum", i.e., spelt the same way as neuter adjective [https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/decessum#Latin]. Above is said "(The comment on Wikispecies, that decessum is a noun, is wrong:". I don't agree it says that - it reads "the epithet "decessum" is treated as a noun". Unless you or someone well versed in linguistics can explain why not, to me any case of a noun such as "decessum" is still a noun. As for "You assert in your rename requests that this word is now treated as an "invariant noun (on whose authority? no source is cited)", the Wikispecies already states "Under ICZN Art. 31.2.2". So it's under the authority of that article of the ICZN, i felt that was clear. Here's what that article says: "31.2.2. Where the author of a species-group name did not indicate whether he or she regarded it as a noun or as an adjective, and where it may be regarded as either and the evidence of usage is not decisive, it is to be treated as a noun in apposition to the name of its genus (the original spelling is to be retained, with gender ending unchanged." Now, with that in hand (and admitting i was wrong on the genitive), the crux really is whether "decessum" in the accursative singular would fit with "31.2.2." or not. I'd wrongly switched the Wikispecies wording to specify the genitive plural as i felt other things said by ICZN allow for nouns of species epithets to be in nominative (as said repeatedly above by Crawdad Blues but also allows them as genitives. As the noun spelling is neither nominative nor genitive, i now feel things get murky. Firstly, does the text in "31.2.2" exclude nouns in accursative singular? I'd say that text is ambiguous about cases. Secondly, if for argument sake we accept decessum as a noun, and its accursative case as acceptable, then follow adoption that way, i can't agree when Crawdad Blues said "that would be decessus, not decessum". I'd say "31.2.2" clearly reads that "the original spelling is to be retained, with gender ending unchanged" ergo decessum. Ok, all that said, back to IF decessum were the genitive spelling, i'd hold strong on maintaining it can be treated as a noun and case closed. But now i've realised it's only in accurative singular, then we're into some arcane arguments about interpretation of ICZN wording if err towards decessum - which i'm increasingly seeing as quite tenuous. What's really problematic as a consequence is that decessum is widely adopted in many sources (databases, pulbications etc), and to try to 'kill that' is going to be painful compared to what initially seemed simple to just get a few more of the Wiki stuff inline! What's really awful though is that lawyers get paid vast sums of money to interpret arcane wording in ambiguously worded codes, yet taxonomists just get grief! Sjl197 (talk) 06:36, 17 July 2024 (UTC)

I'm traveling now and am not very adept at writing on a mobile device (I am not part of the generation that grew up typing with my thumbs!), but I have three comments, which I will try to make as brief as possible:

(1) On the question of whether an accusative noun is permissible in a Latin name, the answer is no. Since Linnaeus Latin binomials have traditionally been given in the nominative form. The names of genera and all higher taxonomic divisions are always nominative. Specific names are almost always nominative, whether they are adjectives (nominative by agreement with the genus name) or nouns (nominative in apposition to the genus name). The only exception is that specific names can also be expressed as genitive modifiers; most of these are proper nouns, the names of places or people, used to describe the range or habitat of a species or the person in whose honor it was named. But as I think everyone here has now acknowledged, decessum is not genitive. And there is absolutely no way in which an accusative noun can be used in apposition to a nominative generic name like Psilota. See ICZN 11.8 and 11.9. This is a dead end.

(2) If, as Sjl197 says, the solecism P. decessum is "out there" in places like iNaturalist, this is probably due to the unfortunate typographical errors in Thompson 2008, which was poorly copyedited and proofread (full ref and link to this article on the Wikispecies page). Thompson writes decessa on pp. 3 and 16, but decessum on pp. 2, 6, and 7. Obviously, these are not both correct, but once the form Psilota decessum crept into the article (an easy slip since Hutton's original name was Melanostoma decessum), it's easy to understand why the error would make its way into user-generated databases like iNat, since most amateur natural historians, and indeed most professional biologists these days, don't have enough training in Latin to see at once that such a name is impossible. (This is not intended to be a dig at you, Sjl; it's just the way things are. Unlike you, I am not a professional biologist, and I'm sure you know way more about the biology of hoverflies than I do, but by your own admission Latin is not your strongest suit.) Is there any evidence that anyone at all used the form P. decessum before the publication of Thompson's article? If not, my guess is that that is where the confusion began. And of course this is a constant problem on the internet: once misinformation starts circulating online, more and more well-meaning people will say, well, it's "out there", so there must be a reason, and they will start trying to come up with possible explanations, as you did. But in this case all of your ingenuity was wasted in defense of a misprint.

(3) User:Elizium23 asks "does anyone have a reliable secondary source ... which clearly documents that decessa is the preferred and modern name?" This question is precisely backward. The real question is, is there any reliable source - by which I mean a peer-reviewed academic publication, not a user-generated online database - to suggest that the name has been officially changed to decessum? I haven't searched exhaustively (again, traveling, mobile, ugh) but I can't find one. But I'll answer Elizium's question anyway, with a strong affirmative. P. decessa is a New Zealand endemic; it appears nowhere else in the world. The principal taxonomic authority for New Zealand biota is the New Zealand Inventory of Biodiversity (NZIB), published beginning in 2009. For P. decessa, see Macfarlane et al., Phylum Arthropoda Subphylum Hexapoda: Protura, springtails, Diplura, and insects. Checklist of New Zealand Hexapoda, in volume 2 of NZIB, which appeared in 2010 (after Thompson's article, so plenty of time for them to take it into account if it needed to be). See also this page at NZOR (the New Zealand Organism Register) for more information. As far as the scientific community of NZ is concerned, the name of this fly is Psilota decessa. That the users of iNat and other such sites may be confused about the name is irrelevant, especially when error is easily explained by the typographical errors in Thompson.

If the malformed name P. decessum is circulating on the internet, the most useful thing that Wikipedia, Wikispecies, and the Commons can do is ignore it and continue to use the official name as published in peer-reviewed academic publications, most authoritatively in the NZIB. There is no benefit in muddying the waters further by perpetuating the confusion that appears in some online databases with user-generated content. I sympathize with Sjl's frustration; I know they made their changes in good faith, in an effort to reconcile the irreconcilable, and I'm sorry to see the effort wasted. But the category and the files that have been changed should be reverted.

Apologies to all if the tone of my earlier remarks was brusque and peremptory: I did not intend to sound as if I was pronouncing the truth ex cathedra. I'll be back home and able to respond to further questions on Friday. Best wishes to all, Crawdad Blues (talk) 16:06, 17 July 2024 (UTC)

Unsourced data on Commons?

I found a number of images of graphs without sources, and I now wonder if this is permissible on Commons. Two of the files are in use on itwiki, and no sources have been provided there either; if anything, the images themselves appear to be used as sources. So I hope you understand why I feel the need to bring this up.

I've sorted them under Category:Matrimoni religosi e civili (image set) and initiated a discussion at Commons:Categories for discussion/2024/07/Category:Matrimoni religosi e civili (image set). Sinigh (talk) 12:30, 17 July 2024 (UTC)

Commons is not Wikipedia, it doesn't have sourcing requirements (other than source of origin of the media for copyright reasons). See Project scope/Neutral point of view (mostly). —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 12:51, 17 July 2024 (UTC)

Add this template to such files: Template:Datasource missing and see Category:Information graphics without data source.

Something really needs to be done (I'm not saying they all should be deleted). I'm most concerned about files without source prominently featured in Wikipedia articles like File:Fertility Map.png or File:Projected Total Births 2020 2025.png. One could start with a GLAMorgan scan for files in that category that are used (the scan should run faster in a month or so) and discuss this on Wikipedia talk pages because it seems like nothing can be done from WMC side. Prototyperspective (talk) 14:56, 17 July 2024 (UTC)

Thanks! I should have been able to find that template myself. I agree with the current policy, but I think makes sense in cases like these to at least show users and readers that there's no source for the data presented. That too is educationally useful and informative, to say the least. Sinigh (talk) 15:33, 17 July 2024 (UTC)

That's why the template adds a red-colored infobox below the image. The Problem with that is people don't see it because Wikipedia shows images when clicking on them in a way that doesn't show much info from the WMC page. On Wikipedia, I think the respective image descriptions could be tagged with en:Template:Citation needed or similar templates and the WMC category could be a way to find them. Note that many of these use many different sources combined in one image but these should be specified in the file description and often also as refs where the image is used. Agree with you. Prototyperspective (talk) 15:38, 17 July 2024 (UTC)

This section is resolved and can be archived. If you disagree, replace this template with your comment. Sinigh (talk) 19:50, 23 July 2024 (UTC)

Mysterious Intel microprocessor/IC

Hi folks!

I recently bought 2 Intel processors (I couldn't resist, as they look so similar to the famous Intel 4004), but I don't know what the purpose could be. Looking at the ceramic package, I can imagine that the product was created maybe between 1972 and 1975. Maybe someone can give a hint?

• 
  Oblique view
• 
  Top view

Thanks and greetings! --PantheraLeo1359531 😺 (talk) 18:26, 17 July 2024 (UTC)

It might be stamped with a manufacturer's part number. You could unsolder one of the lids and look at the die. Glrx (talk) 04:09, 18 July 2024 (UTC)

Results of Wiki Loves Folklore 2024 is out!

Hi, Greetings

The winners for Wiki Loves Folklore 2024 is announced!

We are happy to share with you winning images for this year's edition. This year saw over 41,038 images from 1921 uploaders represented on Commons in over 140 countries. Kindly see images here.

Our profound gratitude to all the people who participated and organized local contests and photo walks for this project.

We hope to have you contribute to the campaign next year.

Thank you,

Wiki Loves Folklore International Team

Rockpeterson (talk) 08:25, 18 July 2024 (UTC)

empty sub-categories of Category:EuroGames_2024_Vienna

Please do not delete empty sub-categories of Category:EuroGames_2024_Vienna as we have live event action for next 5 days and many sub-categories will be populated even if you find them empty. Thank you for understanding on behalf of #WikiLovesPride organizers. -- Zblace (talk) 10:11, 18 July 2024 (UTC)

Book covers' copyright

Hello! I'm the project manager of WoALUG and we're thinking of holding a GLAM project with a local museum. Can anyone advise me about what kind of book covers I can and cannot upload here and how exactly to do that? Thank you in advance!. --Vyolltsa (talk) 10:41, 18 July 2024 (UTC)

COM:BOOK is a brief summary about the matter. --Geohakkeri (talk) 10:44, 18 July 2024 (UTC)

Wikimedia Movement Charter ratification voting results

You can find this message translated into additional languages on Meta-wiki. Please help translate to your language

Hello everyone,

After carefully tallying both individual and affiliate votes, the Charter Electoral Commission is pleased to announce the final results of the Wikimedia Movement Charter voting.  

As communicated by the Charter Electoral Commission, we reached the quorum for both Affiliate and individual votes by the time the vote closed on July 9, 23:59 UTC. We thank all 2,451 individuals and 129 Affiliate representatives who voted in the ratification process. Your votes and comments are invaluable for the future steps in Movement Strategy.

The final results of the Wikimedia Movement Charter ratification voting held between 25 June and 9 July 2024 are as follows:

Individual vote:

Out of 2,451 individuals who voted as of July 9 23:59 (UTC), 2,446 have been accepted as valid votes. Among these, 1,710 voted “yes”; 623 voted “no”; and 113 selected “–” (neutral). Because the neutral votes don’t count towards the total number of votes cast, 73.30% voted to approve the Charter (1710/2333), while 26.70% voted to reject the Charter (623/2333).

Affiliates vote:

Out of 129 Affiliates designated voters who voted as of July 9 23:59 (UTC), 129 votes are confirmed as valid votes. Among these, 93 voted “yes”; 18 voted “no”; and 18 selected “–” (neutral). Because the neutral votes don’t count towards the total number of votes cast, 83.78% voted to approve the Charter (93/111), while 16.22% voted to reject the Charter (18/111).

Board of Trustees of the Wikimedia Foundation:

The Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees voted not to ratify the proposed Charter during their special Board meeting on July 8, 2024. The Chair of the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees, Nataliia Tymkiv, shared the result of the vote, the resolution, meeting minutes and proposed next steps.  

With this, the Wikimedia Movement Charter in its current revision is not ratified.

We thank you for your participation in this important moment in our movement’s governance.

The Charter Electoral Commission,

Abhinav619, Borschts, Iwuala Lucy, Tochiprecious, Der-Wir-Ing

MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 17:51, 18 July 2024 (UTC)

German currency files without machine-readable license

Category:Files with no license using PD-GermanGov-currency has 3,409 files which reside in Category:Files with no machine-readable license due to the fact that they use {{PD-GermanGov-currency}} ex-license which was decommissioned some years ago. Some previous discussions:

• Commons:Village_pump/Copyright/Archive/2012/07#German_currency (2012)
• Commons:Deletion requests/Template:PD-GermanGov-currency (from 2013)
• COM:CUR#Germany

Those files were nominated for deletion in 2013, but saved because it was determined that due "the response from the German government, which is now an OTRS ticket, it would appear that the hosting of these files is in line with Commons' policies." That is great, news but the files still have to have some valid license. Can some German speakers or people understanding nuances of German law help us determine if we need to create some new license templates, resurrect {{PD-GermanGov-currency}}, or delete those files? Jarekt (talk) 03:45, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

Per COM:CUR#Germany, German currency units are "Not OK except for Deutsche Mark bank notes". They can still be ok though if they're some kind of PD-old or PD-ineligible. The Deutsche Mark bank notes would probably need some new specialised license tag. The others will need to be examined one by one if they're ok for PD-old or PD-ineligible reasons, else they will need to be nominated for deletion. This is an ongoing process, just like the one concerning German stamps. I've looked at files showing German currency every now and then and either nominated them for deletion (Category:Currency related deletion requests) or replaced the PD-GermanGov-currency tag with the proper license tags. --Rosenzweig τ 07:46, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

@Rosenzweig: That is a great work you are doing in Category:German currency-related deletion requests/deleted, and a bit sad, as nobody wants to delete good files. The issue is that last time we looked at this in 2013, people were debating about 500 files in Category:PD-GermanGov-currency but 11 years latter we have 3697 files in the same category, so it seems like we gain German currency files with no license much faster than we loose them. Maybe we can start with new PD template for Deutsche Mark bank notes. What would be the rationale behind it? --Jarekt (talk) 12:56, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

I've also removed the deprecated tag from quite a few and added proper PD license tags, so it's not just deletions. The problem is that the PD-GermanGov-currency tag wasn't really properly deprecated until November 2023, so uploaders kept using it and adding files. The DM bank note conditions seem to be in VRT ticket:2012081410006029, someone would have to look at that. Though reading through Commons:Deletion requests/Template:PD-GermanGov-currency I'm a bit skeptical if they would be enough for today's Wikimedia Commons. --Rosenzweig τ 13:55, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

@Rosenzweig: , According to Krd, the ticket:2012081410006029 contains an e-mail from the German Federal Bank stating:

• They cannot answer if DM notes are PDGov ("Amtliches Werk"). This has to be decided by court if required, but they are not aware of any precedent. They do not object the use of the images if they are unmodified and used in good faith.
• They don't have any business in Euro, GDR currency or Reichmark and refer to the department of finance, or the KFW regarding GDR.

That does not seem like a good basis for PD template. So we would have to assume that all the files in Category:Files with no license using PD-GermanGov-currency are copyrighted unless we can prove otherwise. Is PD-old-70 our best option or are there some other exceptions which can be used? --Jarekt (talk) 13:30, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

I suspected it might be something like that, sadly.

We might be able to use {{PD-Germany-§134-KUG}} for some files. That is a very tricky template with several requirements:

• Can only be used for works published for the first time before 1966.
• Those works must be at least 70 years old, so as of 2024, only works before 1954 are eligible. Next year, works from 1954 will become eligible, etc.
• A personal author/artist MUST NOT be named on/in the work. Which should be usually the case with bank notes (not always with 1920s emergency money though), but coins might contain initials of the designer, which is enough for them to be named.
• A corporate entity of a specific kind (a legal entity under public law, de:Körperschaft des öffentlichen Rechts (Deutschland)) MUST be named on the work. The German Federal Bank, the German state itself or one of its subdivisions would fulfil this criterion.

That would need to be examined and decided on a case by case basis. For any works past 1965, we could not use it.

And, per Commons:Licensing, we also would have to consider US copyright (the URAA), which would mean only works which are at least 95 years old are ok. Unless we can find some provision in US law that (foreign) currency units are generally in the PD, which I'm not aware of right now. ---Rosenzweig τ 13:54, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

@Rosenzweig: , That would also mean that coins and banknotes published after 1953 can not use {{PD-old-70}}, {{PD-anon-70-EU}} or {{PD-Germany-§134-KUG}}. Those can be isolated and proposed for deletion. As for US laws, I have not seen any deletions of works in PD in home country but not in the US in last decade or so, so it is less of a priority, but it would not hurt to add {{PD-US-expired}} to currency from before 1929. Another possible approach would be to rewrite {{PD-GermanGov-currency}} as a "previously considered PD" but now no known restrictions license tag before nominating for deletion. Those files do not have known restrictions and seem no worse than other files with no known restrictions license tags. --Jarekt (talk) 16:50, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

@Jarekt: I disagree about US copyright, COM:Licensing is an official policy here at Wikimedia Commons, and files are still deleted because they're not yet in the public domain in the US. If you doubt that, just take a look at current deletion requests. So we should stick to the official policy. The German wikipedia only applies German/Austrian/Swiss copyright law, so some files could perhaps be reuploaded there on demand.

As for a "No known restrictions" license tag, are there really no restrictions? The Federal Bank more or less declares that they won't interfere (similarly here), but is that enough and free enough for a license tag? --Rosenzweig τ 17:35, 9 July 2024 (UTC)

I've looked at the category over the last few days, and it seems that a very large chunk of the files are Notgeld (emergency money) banknotes from 1923 or earlier, uploaded by a handful of users over the last five years or so (which would at least partially explain the increase in the number of files over 11 years). We will be able to keep the majority of those, either with PD-Germany-§134-KUG or because their (named) artists can be identified and died over 70 years ago. Some will have to be deleted though until they can be gradually restored over the next 25 years or so. But sorting all that out will take time. Regarding the other files (which are not Notgeld), most of the older coins and bills from the 1920s and earlier can likely be kept as well. Anything after that will probably have to be deleted and can then also be gradually restored, though very new coins and bills won't be in the PD for many many decades. --Rosenzweig τ 11:43, 14 July 2024 (UTC)

@Rosenzweig: , I did a few things to push things along:

• Created Commons:Deletion requests/German currency after 1953 with files using {{PD-GermanGov-currency}} showing currency published after 1953.
• Added {{PD-US-expired}} to currency from before 1929. That tag is not a substitute for required copyright tag which is valid in Germany, but it keeps files out of Category:Files with no machine-readable license so there is more time to sort out the copyrights of the individual files.
• I removed the files from above 2 groups from Category:Files with no license using PD-GermanGov-currency which shrunk from 3,409 files to 57 files. Files in that category should be in Category:Files with no machine-readable license, have {{PD-GermanGov-currency}} template, and are not nominated for deletion. Some of them are from 1929-1953 years, and some from undetermined time.

--Jarekt (talk) 23:52, 19 July 2024 (UTC)

POTY (Picture of the Year) competition needs help!

POTY desperately needs new volunteers who can do the things required to run the competition. With the current state of the committee, it is likely that there will be no POTY this year, as the main member who ran scripts for the competition has burned-out from doing wikipedia tasks and isn't up for it. Others on the committee are also missing in action.

Check out the discussion here. Shawnqual (talk) 04:46, 6 July 2024 (UTC)

In the past few months there was a conversation on Commons with someone from the WMF about WMF prioritization of Wikipedias vs Commons this year. Does anyone remember who that is, could they be pinged to make them aware of this issue? I recall part of that conversation was on how Commons is not particularly focused on disseminating and sharing its content - POTY is probably the most visible initiative for Commons to share its top quality images, including outside Wikimedia, and widely engage with Wikimedia contributors across all projects (are there any stats on how many people engage with POTY, and from which wikis?). I'm sure resources for 2024 are already prioritized but visibility could help for 2025. cc @Rhododendrites who I believe was part of that conversation. - Consigned (talk) 10:11, 6 July 2024 (UTC)

This has now come up in several places. The conversation you're referring to is probably this one. There's also some background on the POTY talk page, and on Jimbo's enwp page. — Rhododendrites ^talk |  11:35, 6 July 2024 (UTC)

I think we have a problem if the commons community cannot run a photo competition without WMF's help (Or the help of people who have done it in the past. Helping out once should not imply you are signing up to help every year for the rest of your life). There are aspects of the site's operation that fall on the shoulders of WMF, but a photo competition is surely not one of them. Bawolff (talk) 07:48, 12 July 2024 (UTC)

Please someone save POTY ! This is a very important matter. The POTY contest has been completed successfully every year since 2006 and we can not let it die ! Any help is welcome. -- Giles Laurent (talk) 09:18, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

Seems unsolved (removed solved template). I don't have much else to add than that but I think it would be best to build things so that POTY doesn't require much time or effort to run each year. Just use the same templates, designs, scripts, bots, etc like the year before. --Prototyperspective (talk) 10:48, 19 July 2024 (UTC)

Problem is that it seems like almost no one knows how to simply run the scripts... Giles Laurent (talk) 18:01, 19 July 2024 (UTC)

Works of art of men smoking (activity)

I've just noticed an item, moved from Category:Smoking men in art to Category:Works of art of men smoking (activity). That just rolls of the tongue, its so intuitive (sic). I thought that brevity was supposed to be the way to go. That what was important, was, that titles be consistent, brief getting to the point quickly, even be elegant. Works of art of men smoking (activity) is the exact opposite of that.

As an aside, what was wrong with just Smoking cigarettes, which is how a commercial endeavour would probably do it. Only humans, of all the animals, are stupid enough to smoke.

Another cat recently moved, from Category:Walking men]] to Category:Men walking. Somehow, I got used to using titles that led with the verb, now, not the case. It has to be the noun.

Why can't there be both, is that such a deal breaker? Broichmore (talk) 16:16, 15 July 2024 (UTC)

See also Commons:Categories for discussion/2024/07/Category:Works of art of women smoking (activity).

 Agree with Broichmore that category names should be as short as possible. Therefor I prefer Category:Smoking men in art above Category:Works of art of men smoking (activity). But sometimes that conflicts with the Universality Principle. So then we should have a discussion about what prevails: short category names or the Universality principle (or any other principle on Commons)? JopkeB (talk) 07:56, 16 July 2024 (UTC)

I likewise agree that brevity is preferable, but not at the expense of clarity. We need to maximize accessibility for all users, not just those of us who have been around long enough to 'get used to' idiosyncrasies. As for changing this category:

1. It seems already agreed to return to 'in art' from 'works of art' in the above linked CfD.
2. Discussion over whether or not (activity) is a useful dab is at Commons:Categories for discussion/2024/07/Category:Smoking (activity), so that dab may also be done away with shortly.

Josh (talk) 13:11, 16 July 2024 (UTC)

The above linked discussion has just come to its conclusion, the rest of the discussion continues here: Commons:Categories for discussion/2024/07/Category:Smoking (activity). ReneeWrites (talk) 05:53, 19 July 2024 (UTC)

Oak Island's map

Hello, I have a question regarding the Oak Island's map. The map on Commons corresponds to maps from Google Earth and OpenStreetMap.

We are :

• Smith’s Cove = south
• Sheerdam Cove = east
• Sellars Cove = north

These names are included on recent maps found on the web. But when we look for old plans, or in books about the island (page 7), we find:

• Smith’s Cove = east
• South Shore Cove = south
• Joudrey’s Cove = north

Which version is correct? Thanks, Sincerely --Tylwyth Eldar (talk) 15:43, 16 July 2024 (UTC)

@Tylwyth Eldar: why do you think one has to be more "correct"? Names often change over time. - Jmabel ! talk 21:19, 16 July 2024 (UTC)

Bonjour @Jmabel: Thank you for your reply. A place name can evolve over the centuries, but to move like as here with Smith’s Cove, over such a short time? I find that very strange. Such a change doesn't help in reconstructing the history of a place and finding good information. With no explanation for this change, we mix up names and make mistakes. If this change is official, when did it take place? Is there any way to find an official reference ? --Tylwyth Eldar (talk) 18:31, 17 July 2024 (UTC)

Ah, I misunderstood. Well, the page is (semi-)clear about citing its source. "Own work" is dubious for just a crop; it would have been very useful to have a URL link to OSM so it would be easy to see if the labeling has changed there since (it hasn't, and Google Maps has the same for the two coves it labels). {{Fact disputed}} might be in order on both maps we host, noting that they disagree with each other. - Jmabel ! talk 19:19, 17 July 2024 (UTC)

Done and Question asked on the discussion page . Thank you! --Tylwyth Eldar (talk) 05:26, 19 July 2024 (UTC)

Category:Flickr streams/Category:Photographs by Flickr photographer

You know. Wouldn't it be more efficient if these categories were populated by bots rather than users having to take time off to add the categories manually? Like all images whos author is listed as amaianos would automatically be placed into Category:Photographs by amaianos and etc.--Trade (talk) 00:42, 17 July 2024 (UTC)

@Trade: I'm sure no one would object to a bot filling in any valid category of this sort. Only caution: not every Flickr account corresponds to a photographer, and I've occasionally seen some wrong categories formed on the assumption that they do. - Jmabel ! talk 04:29, 17 July 2024 (UTC)

It's really annoying when you create a FlickR stream category for someone and they already have dozens of photos on Commons Trade (talk) 13:57, 17 July 2024 (UTC)

Agree. And there are more categories like that. The overly manual categorization also means that, at least over time, files are missing in categories when people think it contains all the files for a subject. For example take the category WebM videos which is still added manually and where I pointed this out here with some other example. One could list more examples and this issue relates to a technical idea to fix this issue that I would propose once there is some basic level of tech development or volunteer dev campaigning. If volunteer contributors time spent for such tasks is reduced, they can spend it on other contributions. Prototyperspective (talk) 09:57, 17 July 2024 (UTC)

"why categories for filetypes aren't automatically added". Because links are already overused in Commons. We just had a whole set of changes to reduce the amount of total links because Commons was reaching technical limits of the database. If you want to list video files, you can query the DB table for files, you can filter in the search results and sometimes, you can even use CommonsData. If Petscan doesn't support that... fix Petscan. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 12:59, 17 July 2024 (UTC)

The fact that categories are easily and visible accessible to everyone and while things like DB tables, CommonsData and etc you have to go out of your way to search for already excludes most visitors and users on Commons.

It's a bizarre design choice if we are supposed to discourage the former in favor of encouraging the later Trade (talk) 14:01, 17 July 2024 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you're saying. Maybe you refer to categories which are links to their respective pages with "links [that are overused]" but I don't know. Filtering for video files only works for search results (especially with the MediaSearch) but not subject-level categories. Not every video about some subject has the search term of that in the title or description (or if it has not necessarily the English one). That would leave searching a category with deepcategory and filtering by filetype. However, that does not work on large categories. If it did, it would need to be made more accessible – subcategories "Videos of…" can be seen and simply clicked but there is no button/dropdown for seeing videos in a category. Yes, already created a petscan issue about it. Prototyperspective (talk) 14:28, 17 July 2024 (UTC)

Category links are the rows in the database used to indicate that a file or page is a member of a category, i.e. if a page is in five categories, there are five category link rows for that page. The total number of category links on Commons is extremely large, to the extent that it causes some performance issues and is blocking changes to category sorting (phab:T362494). New categorization practices which will introduce a large number of new category links, like categorizing files by their file type, need to be avoided. Omphalographer (talk) 00:04, 19 July 2024 (UTC)

Thanks for the clarifications. Videos are already being categorized by their filetype, I was arguing these cats need to be (nearly) complete or they're near useless OR that features like showing only video files are added to petscan / category intersection and these categories be deleted as redundant thereafter (insofar there is no other real value/use of these). In addition, it seems like some technical changes are required, e.g. how this data is stored, cached and read. Prototyperspective (talk) 11:11, 19 July 2024 (UTC)

Freedom of panorama for photos taken across the border

Specifically about this image, but since it seems to be a more general topic, I'll ask at the village pump. This photo shows the architecture of Myanmar, taken from across the border in Thailand. While Myanmar does not allow freedom of panorama, Thailand does. What is the copyright status of such pictures? --Nux-vomica 1007 (talk) 22:48, 18 July 2024 (UTC)

@Nux-vomica 1007 see COM:FOP#Choice of law. There have been instances of accepting South Korean buildings that were taken from the North Korean side, using NoKor copyright law that is more lenient on reproductions of buildings (something that SoKor law prohibits if the images are reproduced as copies to be sold). Perhaps we may use Thai FoP in this case, unless the architect of those buildings who knows about Burmese law sends a cease-and-desist letter to Wikimedia, but for now the chances of this happening is low. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contrib's.) 02:02, 19 July 2024 (UTC)

Thank you very much. I did not realize that there was a clear answer in the document. Nux-vomica 1007 (talk) 03:02, 19 July 2024 (UTC)

@JWilz12345: Similar cases also occurred at Three Countries Bridge, a bridge that crossed France, Germany and Switzerland, in which France has no FOP, and the latter two has. --A1Cafel (talk) 05:59, 19 July 2024 (UTC)

Glitch

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T370304

I’m getting this (with varying timestamp and UUID, of course):

MediaWiki internal error.
 
Original exception: [c8480c01-eec0-4e32-bcc2-c880ee466574] 2024-07-19 00:26:48: Fatal exception of type "Wikimedia\Rdbms\DBUnexpectedError"
 
Exception caught inside exception handler.
 
Set $wgShowExceptionDetails = true; at the bottom of LocalSettings.php to show detailed debugging information.

at every other page I try to load, both in Commons and pt.wp. -- Tuválkin ✉ ✇ 01:01, 19 July 2024 (UTC)

Same here, though not as often as you have experienced. Josh (talk) 15:30, 19 July 2024 (UTC)

This is a Wikimedia wide issue, see linked Phabricator task. — Speravir – 23:57, 19 July 2024 (UTC)

Video question

https://vimeo.com/986935006 (my own work). Am I correct that the visual portion of this would be OK to free-license and upload to Commons, but not the audio? - Jmabel ! talk 06:36, 19 July 2024 (UTC)

• Looks okay to me, the structures are obviously old enough, and due to the lighting conditions and the principle of a "Beiwerk", I don't see problems with personality rights --PantheraLeo1359531 😺 (talk) 07:23, 19 July 2024 (UTC)
• Not hearing much back, I guess I'll assume I got this right, and if I'm wrong someone can always DR. Thank you PantheraLeo1359531 for weighing in. - Jmabel ! talk 19:06, 19 July 2024 (UTC)

I guess there are plenty of videos like these on the internet :) --PantheraLeo1359531 😺 (talk) 19:08, 19 July 2024 (UTC)

What are free media resources for illustrations?

I think illustrations (recent examples) are some of the most useful, most educational, and most needed kind of media on Wikimedia Commons.

What are some good sources for them? Please see Commons:Free media resources/Illustrations which I just created but as of now only has one item.

Moreover, could there be another list for free media resources for datagraphics like charts? Currently, I don't know of many items for such a list either except for Our World in Data. Prototyperspective (talk) 13:19, 15 July 2024 (UTC)

Still only one item. I guess Flickr could be added because there also are illustrations on it, is there some particular tag for these or a subpage? Anything else? Prototyperspective (talk) 19:30, 20 July 2024 (UTC)

Croptool

I'm not sure if this is just an issue that I have or whether everyone else on Commons has the same problem. On https://croptool.toolforge.org/ I have successfully used this tool for sometime, but now the "Preview" button is not working. I have tried for over a week now without any success. Can you please give me some advice. Thanks. SethWhales ^talk 17:24, 20 July 2024 (UTC)

@Seth Whales: see Commons_talk:CropTool#Broken. - Jmabel ! talk 19:25, 20 July 2024 (UTC)

@Jmabel: Thank you. SethWhales ^talk 05:00, 21 July 2024 (UTC)

Error during upload

Hello, I got some error during upload and these files is not possible finish correctly: File:Nové značení v LN - kotoučky 01.jpg and File:Nové značení v LN - kotoučky 02.jpg. Do somebody know what to do? Is it possible to edit these pages and add description and categories or somebody have to delete it first? Thank you. Palu (talk) 01:44, 21 July 2024 (UTC)

@Palu: just copy-paste the wikitext from a file page for another of your uploads and edit accordingly. No one can do this for you, because only you can grant the license. - Jmabel ! talk 03:08, 21 July 2024 (UTC)

No, editation is not possible due to error: "In order to edit the page, you must first load the file." Palu (talk) 08:57, 21 July 2024 (UTC)

There was some bug but I was able to create the pages. Now you can add the correct content. GPSLeo (talk) 09:16, 21 July 2024 (UTC)

Thank you, now worked perfectly, done. --Palu (talk) 11:31, 21 July 2024 (UTC)

Appropiate mother-cats🐈 for Category:Intel 8286

Hi!

I am looking for fitting mother-cats of Category:Intel 8286. Intel 8286 is a so called "bidirectional bus driver", but I am failing to find good cats. Maybe it would even qualify as some type of microprocessor. Anyway, hardware drivers only refers to software working as driver, and the bus driver means usually a person who controls the bus while driving. Thanks!

Greetings --PantheraLeo1359531 😺 (talk) 10:07, 21 July 2024 (UTC)

@PantheraLeo1359531: It should be in several categories under Category:Integrated circuits. Category:Intel integrated circuits is an obvious one. Which category under Category:Integrated circuits by function is less clear. Comparing the 8286 datasheet with my trusty 74-series TTL Data Book, it looks like the 8286 is pretty similar to the to the 74LS245, which Commons categorises under Category:YES gates and Category:Bus transceiver integrated circuits. Those seem like good categories, so I'd put the 8286 in both of them as well. --bjh21 (talk) 13:19, 21 July 2024 (UTC)

Thank you, this is a very detailed answer :) --PantheraLeo1359531 😺 (talk) 13:48, 21 July 2024 (UTC)

Extracted file deleted

The file linked below was extracted from File:GP2303 092018SMG 6499 (1).jpg which is deleted for "No permission since 20 May 2023". How is this file allowed to be kept but not the original one?

File:Oscar Piastri at the 2023 Australian Grand Prix.jpg // Kakan spelar (talk) 17:36, 21 July 2024 (UTC)

@Kakan spelar: I don't see what here calls for a general discussion. Is anything stopping you from nominating it for deletion? - Jmabel ! talk 19:19, 21 July 2024 (UTC)

@Jmabel: No not really, just wanted to know if this was a mistake or why it was still up. I guess I'll nominate it for deletion then. // Kakan spelar (talk) 19:44, 21 July 2024 (UTC)

Political donation from Thomas Crooks - public record image

Greetings, regarding:

• File:FEC Thomas Crooks Donation 202102049425215728 189746.pdf and its derivative,
• File:FEC Thomas Crooks Donation Cropped.jpeg

This is a freely available, public domain government record reflecting "evidence" in the Trump assassination case, specifically the suspect's donation to a political cause. It's been added, removed, perhaps deleted here, and hotly contested in a few areas, but I'd like to bring that debate back to the source.

• On enwiki, en:WP:BLPPRIMARY demands that we can never use primary sources, especially public records, to document a BLP; BLP still applies to Crooks and his family, as well as everyone else involved in the July 13 event.

• There is absolutely no useful information in this image that isn't reflected by secondary, reliable, textual records in news outlets, etc.

• It appears that most or all other "public records" such as photos of Crooks have been deleted from Commons; indeed, they've been replaced and deleted more than once.

• It simply feels creepy and invasive to hold up this paper and say "look look" without any real context or analysis. We've also got to consider en:WP:BLPPRIVACY, even though the document is so thoroughly redacted it's nearly useless.

• I am not sure what deletion criteria to use, and I'm hesitant to start a deletion discussion yet before we've gauged consensus and established a concrete rationale for that. So, thoughts? Elizium23 (talk) 21:29, 20 July 2024 (UTC)
  • I can't see the relevance of the fact that en-wiki does not generally allow primary sources as citations. Commons consists overwhelmingly of primary-source material.
  • It is no more being "h[e]ld up and say[ing] 'look look'" than any other image on Commons.
  • In short, I can't imagine any reason to delete it. How are you saying it differs from, for example, Lee Harvey Oswald's Social Security card, which we have hosted for over a decade? - Jmabel ! talk 22:08, 20 July 2024 (UTC)

Enwiki's policies aren't very relevant for what is and isn't allowed to be hosted on Commons. Commons is mostly concerned with whether images are within the scope of their own project, and whether these media files are freely licensed (you can read about the project scope more here: COM:SCOPE). Images of Thomas Crooks uploaded to Commons were probably deleted for not being released under a free license.

Considering this image is in the public domain, you could only argue it being out of scope to have it deleted, but considering the widespread use it sees across various wikiprojects (not just the English-language one) I don't think you'll have much success there. You could argue for it to be taken down from the enwiki page specifically for being a primary source, but you'd have to make that case there. ReneeWrites (talk) 07:39, 21 July 2024 (UTC)

@Elizium23, Jmabel, and ReneeWrites: I nominated the pdf file for deletion. Regarding the second image, I agree with ReneeWrites. Since it is in use in several articles, it is clearly in scope and there is no valid reason to delete. SCP-2000 15:24, 21 July 2024 (UTC)

I've seen both files and I find them very interesting. I didn't know how political donations in the US looked like (and I don't know if there is any form like that in Spain). So -beyond the shooting and all that- is formative, it improves my knowledge, and therefore I think it's worth being in Commons. Maybe an empty form would be better. But as for now, that one works. B25es (talk) 06:33, 22 July 2024 (UTC)

Commons Impact Metrics now available via data dumps and API

Hi all! I just wanted to let you know that we published a blog post about the new Commons Impact Metrics, a new data product offering monthly data dumps and a new Wikimedia Analytics API for Wikimedia Commons categories of images relating to cultural heritage. These categories include content from libraries, museums, and archives but also visual documentation of natural, built, and living heritage.

Using this data, Commons contributors and their partners can count monthly edits in a category; identify their most active contributors and most viewed files; and understand which Wikimedia projects, languages, and articles are using their images.

You can read more about it (and share it with your partners, if interested) at diff.wikimedia.org. --Sannita (WMF) (talk) 14:11, 22 July 2024 (UTC)

Location

The text: 'This photo is taken in the train.' is not very informative. The line diagram may give a clue.Smiley.toerist (talk) 20:38, 22 July 2024 (UTC)

PS: I started a new category: Category:Rail vehicle floors. Smiley.toerist (talk) 20:40, 22 July 2024 (UTC)

These are MTR C-stock trains in Hong Kong. I've categorized and edited descriptions appropriately. Pi.1415926535 (talk) 20:53, 22 July 2024 (UTC)

(edit conflict) As a wild guess, C Train might refer to TML C-train. --Geohakkeri (talk) 20:54, 22 July 2024 (UTC)

I don't undertand why? Every room has a floor. Train seating is more descriptive here than floor. There was nothing wrong with Category:Train interiors. Broichmore (talk) 07:44, 23 July 2024 (UTC)

The floor category is only for images where the floor is prominent such as File:Osaka metro floor 2024.jpg. I draw the line at showing substantial amount of floor. There are also images showing no floor but the roof File:Chichibu Railway 7000 series interiors 1.jpg Smiley.toerist (talk) 08:13, 23 July 2024 (UTC)

Overlapping templates

Any reason for both Template:Videos from country by year and Template:Videos from the United States by year to exist?--Trade (talk) 03:19, 23 July 2024 (UTC)

Task — Wikimedia logos categorisation

yesterday I wanted to find logos for each Wikimedia project sorting by language and I discovered that there wasn't a category for that (no one shows love to the sister wikis other than Wikipedia). I went ahead and created one and I am creating a discussion to drive more people to help as I won't be able to alone.

you can see the problem below and on Category:English Wikimedia logos, as of course, English has the most work done

Wikimedia logos by language‎ (15 C)

hope this is something that gets people interest. Juwan (talk) 21:01, 23 July 2024 (UTC)

Should documentation start recommending AV1 over VP9?

Pages like Help:Converting video, Commons:File types, etc. generally recommend uploading in VP9/Opus/WebM. In particular, FT bases this off of the MDN Web Docs, which now recommends VP9 for "everyday" video and AV1 for "high quality" video. I think that we, a free file repository, generally fall into the "high quality" bucket (or, that is at least what we try to be, whether or not we get anywhere close is another story). AV1 probably has better support than VP9 at this point... probably, I can't find any good sources with numbers. It also has the bonus of being much simpler, cf. Help talk:Converting video#ffmpeg guidance. Snowmanonahoe (talk) 00:07, 23 July 2024 (UTC)

References

Is it also well usable in FFMPEG? My last level of knowledge is that it is in an experimental phase. I think this would be an important parameter, when working with AV1 --PantheraLeo1359531 😺 (talk) 13:14, 23 July 2024 (UTC)

I've never seen anything that indicates that AV1 support is experimental. I doubt that's still the case as it's been around for six years at this point. Snowmanonahoe (talk) 19:33, 23 July 2024 (UTC)

AV1 works, you can use it. We even serve up all video content in AV1 whenever a browser supports it. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 13:51, 24 July 2024 (UTC)

My historic .svg Inkscape images now showing as blank

Hello, I have been uploading .svg Inkscape coats of arms images for many years. Suddenly now many of them are showing up on Commons as blank shields. For example File:FinchArms.svg. To test it and examine it I saved the blank image from Commons back to my computer, and when I opened it on my Inkscape package, it showed up properly. So the image is still in there somewhere! Can anyone suggest what might have happened, and how to fix the problem? Probably many hundred of my images over many years have been affected, from a brief review of my upload history.Lobsterthermidor (talk) 14:52, 24 July 2024 (UTC)

@Lobsterthermidor: Over time, the software to "render" SVGs (turn SVGs into PNGs shown to users) changes. I'm not a particular expert on SVGs, but I recall that Inkscape's SVGs often have issues in practice over time. If you export as "Plain SVG" I think they will work correctly. Jdforrester (WMF) (talk) 17:02, 24 July 2024 (UTC)

Maybe add a gif version if svg keeps breaking? Enhancing999 (talk) 18:23, 24 July 2024 (UTC)

Gifs in 2024? Sjoerd de Bruin (talk) 18:29, 24 July 2024 (UTC)

Replacing vector files with bitmap files is going backward. Just fix the SVG files. Glrx (talk) 19:46, 24 July 2024 (UTC)

It's an Inkscape bug that is now apparent because WMF uses a stricter SVG rendering engine. The files also do not display on Chome.

Inkscape emits illegal clipPath elements. For example, FinchArms.svg has

    <clipPath clipPathUnits="userSpaceOnUse" id="clipPath2877">
      <g id="g2881" inkscape:label="Layer 1" transform="matrix(0.28222223,0,0,0.28222223,-7.7612925,19.376908)" style="fill:none">
        <path sodipodi:nodetypes="ccscssc" inkscape:connector-curvature="0" id="path2879"
           d="M 79.678451,149.81749 H 646.03583 v 258.58398 c 0,285.48607 -283.17773,397.82031 -283.17773,397.82031 0,0 -196.71555,-78.03561 -262.23435,-269.31836 C 87.532751,498.68407 79.678451,455.94392 79.678451,408.40147 Z"
           style="opacity:1;fill:none;fill-opacity:1;fill-rule:nonzero;stroke:#000000;stroke-width:3;stroke-linecap:round;stroke-miterlimit:4;stroke-dasharray:none;stroke-opacity:1" />
      </g>
    </clipPath>

A clipPath element may not contain a g element. It is only allowed to contain simple shapes such as circles, rectangles, and paths (and a little more).

Glrx (talk) 19:46, 24 July 2024 (UTC)

Thanks for that explanation. Unfortunately I'm not a computer programmer, merely an amateur heraldic artist who has devoted hundreds of hours to creating images for Commons, which always used to show up without any problems. It would be impossible for me to go back over my work of a decade altering the computer code. It seems that the error is on the part of the WMF switching to a "stricter SVG rendering engine". Shouldn't they have considered what effect that might have on existing images? Surely Commons would want to retain all work that has been submitted to it? We trust Commons to value and to securely store and protect our work, not to trash it because they want to move to the inevitable next technological standard? What can be done to bring this problem to the notice of the powers that made this change? Many thanks,Lobsterthermidor (talk) 11:58, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

@Lobsterthermidor: It is not WMF's fault but rather Inkscape's fault. The files were never legal SVG 1.1. https://www.w3.org/TR/SVG11/masking.html states

A ‘clipPath’ element can contain ‘path’ elements, ‘text’ elements, basic shapes (such as ‘circle’) or a ‘use’ element. If a ‘use’ element is a child of a ‘clipPath’ element, it must directly reference ‘path’, ‘text’ or basic shape elements. Indirect references are an error (see Error processing).

Any file with this bug will not validate.

It is not upto WMF or Gnome (the author of the render that WMF uses) to accommodate Inkscape's errors.

Inkscape should be told of the error, and Inkscape should figure out how to fix its tools and the faulty files it produced.

I will fix the FinchArms SVG.

Glrx (talk) 16:51, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

User:Glrx, that is very much appreciated. I have been uploading files like File:FinchArms.svg for many years with no problems at all. What can I do about the several hundred other images I have uploaded which are now blank? Surely this is the result of some recent change made at WMF, which now handles such files differently? Can I try to persuade the person responsible for making this change to keep the old "SVG rendering engine" as an option? Are they aware that the change they have made will be affecting files in this way? Surely I cannot be the only person affected? Thanks again for your invaluable help.Lobsterthermidor (talk) 17:05, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

@Lobsterthermidor: I understand your frustration, but think about what you are asking. The broken SVG files also do not display on Chrome; are you going to ask Chrome to modify its browser to also display your files? Commons wants files to not only display as expected on Commons, but also in browsers all over the world. Things should be fixed where they are broken, and the broken parts here are the SVG files.

I believe there are thousands of SVG files on Commons that will no longer render correctly. That hurts. But those files also do not display correctly on Chrome. The files need to be fixed. The renderer is not broken. Files that violate the SVG specification may not display as we expect.

WMF going back to an old renderer is not a solution for other reasons. The renderer has many other bugs that the newer version fixes. The current version does a much better job at supporting CSS. Furthermore, the current WMF renderer is still out-of-date by several years. We want WMF to update to even more recent renderers rather than going back to one that is essentially 6 years old.

Yes, it is frustrating. But it is not WMF's fault: it is Inkscape's fault.

Glrx (talk) 18:13, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

Lobsterthermidor uploads Glrx (talk) 21:27, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

Need help with correct naming

Hello, I was searching for Czech term "výstaviště" and its category here - výstaviště is place for exhibitions (and sometimes can be also for lunaparks, food festivals, etc.). First my opinion was that in english it is Category:Fairgrounds but according to dictionaries this is only for lunaparks. So I found english term Exhibition grounds and made category. But then I was searching and searching and according this it looks that Fairgrounds is for exhibitions and also lunaparks, not only lunaparks. So I can use this already existing tree of categories. Am I right or...? (if you can, you can shift categories to correct naming immediatelly if its wrong). Thank you very much for your help and sorry for my bad dictionaries :D Palu (talk) 00:57, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

@Palu: May I assume that by "lunapark" you mean "amusement park"? "Amusement park" is not really interchangeable with "fairgrounds". Disneyland is an amusement park, but not a fairground. Fair Park in Dallas is a fairgrounds, but only once a year, as far as I know, does it host anything like an amusement park. - Jmabel ! talk 04:20, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

Yes, correct. So what term is best for "místa kde se dějí primárně výstavy"? Thank you for your help and patience :) --Palu (talk) 06:43, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

So in the end I used artificial intelligence and it told me that both terms are interchangeable, however "exhibition grounds" is more exclusively for exhibitions, while "fairgrounds" is more benevolent (also for entertainment), therefore more universal. So I will unify it on the "fairgrounds". If somebody will evaluate better solution, feel free to correct it. Thank you for your help provided. --Palu (talk) 07:23, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

URAA-restored copyrights of old European postcards

Moved to Commons:Village pump/Copyright#URAA-restored copyrights of old European postcards Smiley.toerist (talk) 11:39, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

New Light rail station in Hannover

This is a new Light rail station in Hannover, that is not yet present on the OpenRailwayMap. It is on the Empelder Strabe just before the turn to Badenstedter Strabe. As the closest side street is Riechersstrabe, I suspect the station wil be called Riechersstrabe, but I am not certain. Smiley.toerist (talk) 10:39, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

Solved: https://en.mapy.cz › ?source=pubt&id=24659906.Smiley.toerist (talk) 10:46, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

Complete map of the moon (luna)

Does the NASA actually offer a complete map or a dataset that covers the moon's whole surface (or at least a big part of it) in form of a webpage or online service? Might be interesting to depict mariae, craters etc. :) --PantheraLeo1359531 😺 (talk) 18:19, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

What are outgoing and incoming wikilinks?

What needs to be done to get pages out of "Pages where lack of wikilinks indicates a problem"? (Source: Commons:Editor's index to Commons)

• Special:DeadendPages – pages with no outgoing wikilinks
• Special:Lonelypages – pages with no incoming wikilinks ("orphan" pages)

1. What are outgoing and incoming wikilinks exactly?
2. Do these gallery pages just need categories (which a lot of them got a long time ago, but they still continue to appear on this list), do they need a Wikidata Infobox, or something else?

JopkeB (talk) 10:05, 21 July 2024 (UTC)

I think on Commons these are not a problem. We don't particularly interlink our galleries. Of course, on other wikis where the analogous space is "article space", the same thing would represent a problem. - Jmabel ! talk 19:17, 21 July 2024 (UTC)

@Jmabel: Thank for your reaction. Next question: are these two Special pages still needed on Commons? JopkeB (talk) 04:55, 23 July 2024 (UTC)

I see no purpose for them. - Jmabel ! talk 19:13, 23 July 2024 (UTC)

@Jmabel: So they might be deleted. What is the deletion procedure for such pages? Where can I drop a request for deletion? JopkeB (talk) 10:42, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

Not sure it's worth the effort, but you could probably file something in phabricator, or you could ask at COM:Village pump/Technical. That is, presuming no one would object; it might be worth running this by COM:Village pump/Proposals first to see if someone disagrees. - Jmabel ! talk 17:42, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

Sounds good. If you find some other that are not really useful here, please have them deactivated too.

You could also add some info to: MediaWiki:Deadendpages-summary, MediaWiki:Deadendpagestext displayed on Special:DeadendPages, etc. Enhancing999 (talk) 18:30, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

MediaWiki:Deadendpages-summary and MediaWiki:Deadendpagestext exist no longer.

I'll follow Jmabel's advice and make a request on COM:Village pump/Technical, see Commons:Village pump/Proposals#Request: delete "Pages where lack of wikilinks indicates a problem". I do not know any other pages that are not useful, but if you know one, please add it to my request on Village pump/Proposals. JopkeB (talk) 05:52, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

They exist, just currently not locally. The second has the text "The following pages do not link to other pages in Wikimedia Commons." if you look at it. Enhancing999 (talk) 05:56, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

Rename error

Hi, I had a rename error and a screen message from the Wikimedia Foundation that something was wrong. Now "[3]" this file is gone. It's not in the redirect either. Normally it's a redirect-fix, but I don't know what to do now. Maybe someone has a solution? - Grtz. - Inertia6084 (talk) (talk) 20:49, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

I found it! File:Helsinki before the Olympics 1952 (JOKAHBL3D C08-19).tif - Inertia6084 (talk) (talk) 20:53, 26 July 2024 (UTC)  Done - Inertia6084 (talk) (talk) 20:53, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

Vote now to fill vacancies of the first U4C

You can find this message translated into additional languages on Meta-wiki. Please help translate to your language

Dear all,

I am writing to you to let you know the voting period for the Universal Code of Conduct Coordinating Committee (U4C) is open now through August 10, 2024. Read the information on the voting page on Meta-wiki to learn more about voting and voter eligibility.

The Universal Code of Conduct Coordinating Committee (U4C) is a global group dedicated to providing an equitable and consistent implementation of the UCoC. Community members were invited to submit their applications for the U4C. For more information and the responsibilities of the U4C, please review the U4C Charter.

Please share this message with members of your community so they can participate as well.

In cooperation with the U4C,

RamzyM (WMF) 02:46, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

A Gartenlaube mystery

I've noticed a phrase within a cropped file, as follows: This file has been extracted from another file: Die Gartenlaube (1856) 561'.jpg. The source image was deleted for reasons that do not affect this image, like a derivative work which is not a part of this cropped image.

What does, this gobbledygook mean?

The file, must have been extracted from a collected volume (or issue) of the magazine, surely? What's deleted is not derivative, it's the source. The very opposite of derivative? That source, might have in it an article, about what, that the image depicts? Here's an example. What am I, missing, here?_ Broichmore (talk) 12:40, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

See my edit. The template tried to find a file for page 561' (with an apostrophe). --Geohakkeri (talk) 13:16, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

(ec) Yes, this fixed it. You borked the pagenumber and this made Template:Extracted from deleted/en appear. Enhancing999 (talk) 13:20, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

Category:Videos by subject

Is there any guidelines or consensus as to how granular the subjects of this category should be? Trade (talk) 04:18, 23 July 2024 (UTC)

I think the general categorization guidelines apply here. The subjects can be as granual as they can get, provided you don't end up with a whole bunch of categories with only 1 media file (Commons doesn't have an official guideline for this I believe, but generally speaking the minumum number of media files should be 3). If a lot of categories share a common trait they can be put in a container category. ReneeWrites (talk) 09:40, 23 July 2024 (UTC)

Less granular than most categories we already have :) —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 13:50, 24 July 2024 (UTC)

• Category:Videos about firearms legislation and the Second Amendment
• Category:Videos about gender roles and gender stereotypes
• Category:Videos about blockchain and cryptocurrency

Is it okay to include two different subjects into the category scope? --Trade (talk) 04:36, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

Managing overpopulated categories

Hello! There are many categories containing hundreds or thousands of files but no subcategories. In some cases, I've found that templates like {{ImageTOC}} make these categories a lot more navigable for future subcategorization, but only if most files are named in a way that allows for it.

What other ways are there to make manually sorting files a bit more manageable? Is it, for example, somehow possible to order images in a given category by the date= parameter in {{Information}} so that they can be more easily sorted into by-year categories? Sinigh (talk) 21:10, 23 July 2024 (UTC)

@Sinigh: Can you give any examples of these categories? That would make it easier to discuss what to do. In most cases, subdividing by date is not the most useful; it's better to subdivide by subject. Pi.1415926535 (talk) 23:20, 23 July 2024 (UTC)

@Pi.1415926535: Yes, "by subject" is of course the most useful one. Here are a few different examples:

• Category:Mountain Warfare Training Center – "by year" goes a long way since the category itself is both location and general subject  Done
• Category:Photographs by Holger Ellgaard – "by subject", but it's probably a good idea to begin with "by year/month" because of the large number of files
• Category:People wearing boonie hats – I don't know what to do here, but most or all photos seem to be from the US military, so maybe that and then "by service"?

Since images have dates and are in other categories that define their subjects, I'm essentially wondering if this could somehow be used to make sorting easier. Bit of a vague question and a long shot. Sinigh (talk) 02:15, 24 July 2024 (UTC)

If topical categories can be broken down by subject, this should be done. Another possibility is by view. I think it's generally a non-issue.

The "Mountain Warfare Training Center"-category may be an illustration of what shouldn't be done: make subcategories by date rather than topical categories:w:Mountain_Warfare_Training_Center#Installation_capabilities can provide suggestions for topics. "Winter" could be another option.

Personally, I think it's terrible habit to make subcategories by subject in photographer categories. Enhancing999 (talk) 10:13, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

What I'm asking for here isn't advice on appropriate subcategories. As for the actual topic of this discussion, I suppose going through images manually and using Cat-a-lot will have to do. Sinigh (talk) 11:48, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

I don't think it's a good idea to break down a user's category merely because you think it's "overpopulated" and you found a tool to do so. Enhancing999 (talk) 11:52, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

And I agree. What do you mean by "a user's category"? Sinigh (talk) 14:36, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

The one above where you mentioned: "it's probably a good idea to begin with "by year/month" because of the large number of files". No. Enhancing999 (talk) 14:38, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

Of course, I misunderstood. Ellgaard was indeed a Wikimedia user late in life, but he was also a photographer for over half a century. That category was created by someone else almost a year after he passed away. I assume that most of his contributions are relatively recent creations intended for Commons, but his uploads are from the 1950s and onward, so I thought (perhaps mistakenly) that chronological categories would be useful there. Sinigh (talk) 14:58, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

Regarding Category:Photographs by Holger Ellgaard, best to leave that well alone. If we want to find items from that collection of a practical use, we would not be looking in that particular cat; we would be looking in whatever cat applied to the content of the file, the fact that the photo was taken by Holger Ellgaard is purely incidental and of no real value. The content however assuredly is.

On the other hand, unlikely, if your interest was Holger Ellgaard, you would be using a search query based on ‘’ Holger Ellgaard’’ against content. Sub catting against photograph, with these volume levels is useless. I can understand if he were an artist in the true sense, painting in oil. Where there is a limited portfolio. Photographers of this type are different, far too prolific. Again, catting against him, even in time is useless. Don’t cat, wherever ‘’search’’ would be the more efficient. _ Broichmore (talk) 19:59, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

All right. :) His Swedish Wikipedia page does say that he had a long career as a photographer and that he documented urban environments that have since changed due to redevelopment, so I just thought it might make sense to try and sort files chronologically in that particular case. Not necessarily to create subcategories, but at least to find out whether any historically notable photos of his even exist on Commons, other than the five examples given in the Wp article. It just felt intuitive at the time. I only had that fleeting idea with regard to that one category, not that whole type of category. This is just to make it abundantly clear that I've never intended to add unnecessary subcategories anywhere. :)

I've had a look at many "Photographs by" categories and created a number of them myself, and I've only ever found two cases where I would even consider adding subcategories: one already had the one subcategory I thought it needed, and the other one is the one we're talking about here. But of course, I don't intend to add anything to it – we're all on the same page. :) Sinigh (talk) 23:38, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

Such a feature would indeed by very useful. Does somebody have a phab issue about that, probably it has been proposed already earlier.

One can only sort by upload date by using incategory:"Cat name" (or deepcategory if it has few subcats) and then sorting the results accordingly, but one can't do so for the data in the Date field.

However, your examples really aren't good and only highlight why it may be important to clear a few things up before such is enabled – I agree with Enhancing999 that files in 'photographs by {name}' cats for example shouldn't be subcategorized by date or subject.

There's many cases where the year or decade would be very useful to have as subcat. Moreover, in many cases such subcats already exist but miss many files which could more easily be fixed if this feature was there. A main issue is that having so many subcats make things often more cumbersome than being helpful to 1) the user seeking images (e.g. any high-quality ones) and 2) contributors seeking to populate/complete a cat where relevant files are buried in deep subcategories rather than being at the top-level; and I have proposed a remedy for that via a proper deepcategory wall-of-images view for cats. Likewise, being able to sort by date in a given cat would also be helpful for users seeking images...especially when for example looking for a recent statistic and a good example is Category:Commons statistics which has many files but most of them being quite old. Prototyperspective (talk) 12:29, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

Oh, I'm not particularly invested in the subcategories I suggested above! I just gave a few different examples of categories because I was asked to, and added a few potential subcategories to quickly show what I was hoping could be done. I did not wish to say or imply that the categories must be structured that way. I'm just here asking for that sorting feature, or method, or any other ideas anyone may have.

But I can definitely see how it seemed that I was arguing for a particular kind of categorization. I hope you can now rest assured that I'm not. (One of the categories has since been divided into subcategories, but not by me.)

I think it's unfortunate that categories like the Ellgaard one aren't very navigable, though. If it shouldn't be subcategorized by date or subject, what then should be done? Should it be left the way it is, with tens of thousands of images all in one place?

As for images being buried in deep subcategories, that is most certainly a problem and a valid complaint, but I always assumed we could have it both ways. Shouldn't it already be possible to automatically sort all images under e.g. "Photographs by John Doe" into a category like "All photographs by John Doe"? Isn't that essentially what happens in flat-list metacategories, like Category:Categories by setting (flat list)? I'm sure there are several other possible or existing solutions that I'm unaware of; this is just one example.

Sinigh (talk) 14:34, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

Sure, I see, this was basically just meant as a note regarding these examples, I didn't took them as being very intentionally chosen or anything of that sort.

In regards to your question of what should be done my proposal in the tech survey mentioned that it could be sortable by number of file uses on Wikipedia or similar things so that most relevant or highest quality files show at the top. Shouldn't it already be possible to automatically sort all […] into a category like "All photographs by John Doe"? good question and I wondered about things like that but currently it's not done and is asked to not be done by COM:OVERCAT. If the category tree is not too deep or the deepcategory search operator is improved one can already see all files in a category branch in one place so this is redundant so I don't think deviation from (a change to) that Commons policy would be a good approach.

On a related note, one thing that seems more considerable is whether files should be removed from a higher level of a category once it's in any subcategory of it or only once its main aspects related to the broader category are captured by subcategories. For example: if a category has subcategories by country/location and by year, should the file already be removed from the broad category once it's in a by-year category (but missing in the by country one)? I think not, but that's probably a topic for another day of which there are too many (topics/tasks not days per contributor). Prototyperspective (talk) 15:13, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

Just adding phab issue on the right.

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T329961

--Prototyperspective (talk) 12:42, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

TIFF to JPG potential loss of quality

I just collected some high quality scans of some Ilford HP5 135 monochrome negatives, shot at 400 ASA, and developed by a professional lab some thirty years back. They are now in TIFF format. So I duly ran a test file through convert from ImageMagick 6.9.11-60 on Ubuntu Linux. The file size shrunk from 74 MiB to 11 MiB — hence just 15% of the original. Should I be worried? Are their options I should apply when using this ImageMagick utility to keep the quality up? TIA. RobbieIanMorrison (talk) 12:39, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

Regardless of whether a solution to the problem mentioned can be found, you can also upload the TIFF scans directly (ideally uncompressed). --Túrelio (talk) 13:29, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

I would prefer to do that and "archive" the original scans on Wikimedia (these images are historically significant, shot in Prague during the Velvet Revolution of 1989). Thanks for your answer Túrelio. RobbieIanMorrison (talk) 13:54, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

Just noting that file --brief reports (edited output): TIFF image data, height=4134, compression=none width=6218. So uncompressed. And the converted JPG is also 6218x4134 and doubtless very compressed. RobbieIanMorrison (talk) 15:24, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

Further question: If I upload the file scan.tif, then I assume that any modifications that I upload must also be in TIFF format. In addition: GIMP prompts to convert from Adobe RGB (1998) to GIMP built-in sRGB and I guess I should reject this suggestion (these images are monochrome so I am really asking for future reference). TIA RobbieIanMorrison (talk) 16:09, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

Yes, sRGB is better from web browsing. And yes, I would upload the original TIFF and a 98%-compressed JPEG. Yann (talk) 10:18, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

@Yann: Please correct me if I am mistaken. But to upload a TIFF file and a JPEG file would be two different file uploads to two different locations. I cannot start with a TIFF and shift to a converted JPEG as a modification at the one location. Surely not? And is there then a template I can use to link these two locations? TIA, RobbieIanMorrison (talk) 23:57, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

@RobbieIanMorrison: correct. See (for example) File:"1775...167th Anniversary...1942" - NARA - 513783.tiff and File:"1775...167th Anniversary...1942" - NARA - 513783.jpg. Note in particular how they link to one another. - Jmabel ! talk 01:01, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

@Jmabel: Exactly what I wanted to know. Many thanks as always! Best, RobbieIanMorrison (talk) 06:51, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

@RobbieIanMorrison you probably want to use compression (the more compatible LWZ or the better compressing ZIP format). magick mogrify -compress LZW -path /target/directory/ /input/path/*tif (or -compress Zip) vips tiffsave input.tif output.tif --compression deflate. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 22:48, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

Converting the images to JPEG at a near-lossless quality (i.e. convert -quality 100 image.tiff image.jpeg) is probably fine. There should be no visually distinguishable difference from the TIFF format scans, especially at that high a resolution, and JPEG images are a bit easier to work with on Commons. Omphalographer (talk) 22:07, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

@Omphalographer: That quality option bumps the converted file size to 22 MiB. Perhaps this is the best workflow in this context? Along with rejecting the suggestion from GIMP to switch to its native color‑space for any subsequent edits. Thanks, RobbieIanMorrison (talk) 06:22, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

TIFF allows for more than 16.7 Million colors (the limit of jpeg). Within the 16.7Millions of colors are only 256 scales of gray from black to white. If the TIFF file actually uses an encoding of more than 16.7M, you would loose that with your monochrome images when converting to jpeg.

The size of a jpeg file does not really tell about the loss by lossy compression. JPEG files use a Huffman table and in most files this is a precomputed standard table. If you generate an indivdual Huffman table optimized for the specific file, the file size is only between 6% and 60% of the input file without quality loss. Tools like jpegrecode use this "trick" and the whole webp file format is based on this trick. C.Suthorn (@Life_is@no-pony.farm - p7.ee/p) (talk) 04:36, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

@C.Suthorn: Thanks. I am going to upload the original TIFFs and converted JPEGs as separate exercises as Jmabel suggests. The scans were made by a high‑end lab in Berlin and quite expensive. So I'd like to keep that primary detail, even if unnecessary in many downstream applications, like viewing on a mobile device. Best, RobbieIanMorrison (talk) 07:02, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

Resolved

My thanks to all who responded. RobbieIanMorrison (talk) 07:03, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

Image Annotation

Hey All We at Wiki Project Med have funded an image annotation tool that meshes with Commons. It is still a little rough around the edges with further ongoing development. If you have suggestions please add them here Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 02:06, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

I totally don't understand what this does. I put in the name of a file on Commons and it offered to upload it to Commons. - Jmabel ! talk 04:23, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

@Jmabel: It looks like the tool works if you just copy and paste the URL for the page instead of the actual image. --Adamant1 (talk) 04:47, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

I can still make no sense of what the tool is supposed to do. It seems to be offering to upload the image over itself. - Jmabel ! talk 17:49, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

@Jmabel:

My take is the tool is a simple web-based graphics editor. The goal of the editor is to take bitmap files (e.g., a JPEG medical image), and add leader lines and text labels to that bitmap (e.g., labeling muscles). After editing, the file can overwrite the original on Commons or write to a new location.

Think about downloading a bitmap file to a Windows machine, using MS Paint to add some text, and then reuploading the file to Commons.

Glrx (talk) 18:23, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

So this is for on-image annotations? And if you overwrite with it on anyone's images except your own, you are almost always violating policy? - Jmabel ! talk 18:49, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

@Doc James: Glrx (talk) 19:47, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

Per Commons:Overwriting existing files one is allowed to make minor improvements followed by overwriting existing files. Otherwise one should upload it as a new file. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 22:46, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

Adding text to an image almost always means limiting its use to a single language, so it is rarely an uncontroversial modification. - Jmabel ! talk 23:41, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

It looks like you can also draw on the image and add shapes to along with the annotations. So it properly shouldn't have the option overwrite files or at least have a warning regardless. Otherwise there's no way people using the tool won't just overwrite images when they should be uploading a new version instead. --Adamant1 (talk) 04:23, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

Both options are present. We can set new image to be the default. Here is a user script to make its use easier https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=User:Doc_James/common.js&diff=prev&oldid=904480749 Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 01:41, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

Pre-implementation discussion on cross-wiki upload restriction

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T370598

The proposal to restrict non-autoconfirmed users from using cross-wiki upload tools has received unanimous support so far, despite proposer's attempts to withdraw the proposal. Do I need to notify all wikis at Tech News or something? Actually, I'm thinking about writing a Phabricator task requesting implementation of such restriction. Furthermore, I'm unsure whether re-proposing this at Meta-wiki is necessary. George Ho (talk) 07:05, 19 July 2024 (UTC)

It was already in the m:Tech/News/2024/29. But we should of course add it again when we have the final date when it comes into force. The idea was to simply do this with a abuse filter as a new functionality for this might take a while to be developed. The other changes need to be done on the lokal Wikis. GPSLeo (talk) 08:10, 19 July 2024 (UTC)

I'm not sure how that will work. What will "the other changes" look like? Isn't it going to require a large scale coordination with sister projects and local sysops, or otherwise cause a major disruption in that many new users will still be invited to do cross-wiki upload locally, prepare uploads, and be told "sorry, you cannot do that" at the end of the workflow? It seems like we need some significant time investment in any way. whym (talk) 11:37, 19 July 2024 (UTC)

The warning that the tool only works if the user was on Commons before and has the rights can simply be added to the default text of mw:Manual:$wgUploadDialog. If local Wikis have overwritten the default text they need to make the change locally. GPSLeo (talk) 14:10, 20 July 2024 (UTC)

Can you suggest an example of the warning text? Will it be clear if the user is allowed to upload or not, and where is the workaround if they are not allowed to proceed? (Something along the lines of "Click here (link), and if it says ___ you cannot upload", "You can still upload if you go to ___"?) Note that not every average user understands what "autoconfirmed" means, or how their centralauth-connected accounts work. I think many will be surprised to see they have "new" Commons accounts when they have contributed to Wikipedia for a long time. whym (talk) 01:36, 21 July 2024 (UTC)

@GPSLeo: All right. Abuse filter first then. After that, "the other changes" can be proposed then, but I think Meta-wiki RFC is one of best options, especially for larger wikis, for central discussion. Unsure why this matter should be resolved locally. George Ho (talk) 00:12, 20 July 2024 (UTC); amended per replies below, 18:28, 20 July 2024 (UTC)

After the tech news and the message on m:Wikimedia Forum there were no responses from other projects. Therefore I think the other projects do not really care about this and therefore I think an additional RFC on Meta is not needed. GPSLeo (talk) 14:05, 20 July 2024 (UTC)

+1. Having an RfC about it on Meta-wiki is super redundant at this point. There's been more then enough time and cross project notifications for people from outside of Commons to comment on this if they wanted to. --Adamant1 (talk) 14:58, 20 July 2024 (UTC)

This phab ticket has been made: phab:T370598. --George Ho (talk) 22:14, 21 July 2024 (UTC)

@Adamant1@GPSLeo@George Ho@Whym one more reason to restrict cross-wiki to experienced users only: File:Unitel Headquarters at Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia.jpg. We restored this since Mongolia now has compatible FoP, but we seem to have failed to take into account its relatively-low resolution for a 2017 upload. Checking through reverse image searching via Google Lens, it appeared it was used in this 2014 Japanese tech article. Note that it was a cross-wiki upload through mn.wikipedia. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contrib's.) 02:10, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

I don't know if not allowing the crosswiki upload tool would have prevented that. Don't we regularly see similar copyright violations uploaded using the normal upload wizard? whym (talk) 12:46, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

Some country missed on File:Flag map of the world.svg

In the map are missed Argentina, Azerbaijan, Cabo Verde, Cambodia, Chile, Comoros, Gabon, Greece, Guinea, Haiti, Ireland, Netherlands, Philippines, Sweden, Tajikistan, Timor Leste, Uzbekistan, Vanuatu and Venezuela. Is there any chances to fix? Many, many and many thanks in advance for all your answers!!! --Gatto bianco (talk) 10:47, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

There is some discussion about this at File_talk:Flag_map_of_the_world.svg. I suppose it should be unfeatured in the meantime. Enhancing999 (talk) 14:09, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

@Enhancing999@Gatto bianco the likes of the Philippines "disappeared" during the remaking of the map in 2010 (so more than a decade has passed). Ping @Transparent 6lue: who made the remaking. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contrib's.) 14:30, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

Oh .. then it's easy to fix: I reverted it to the version that was actually a featured picture on Wikimedia Commons. Different versions should be uploaded under other filenames. Enhancing999 (talk) 14:37, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

Good call. I have renamed the file to "File:Flag map of the world (2009 version).svg". It would be good if an admin could do a history split, and make the more recent version(s) into separate files, named according to date. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 15:31, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

@Enhancing999: Angola is still missed... Gatto bianco (talk) 17:55, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

File:Flag-map of the world.png seems to have it.

Maybe Commons:Graphic_Lab/Map_workshop finds you somebody who wants to make a 2024 version. Enhancing999 (talk) 12:41, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

Chromista, Hacrobia and other non-monophyletic groupings

Should Chromista, Hacrobia, Protozoa and other non-monophyletic groupings be replaced in the taxonavigation templates, or should they stay? Alfa-ketosav (talk) 11:48, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

With what do you want to replace them? Ruslik (talk) 20:06, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

Question about Flickr2Commons

I'm trying to download the images in this album from Flickr using Flickr2commons. All the images are of scanned postcards that are in the public domain. It seems that the user has uploaded them as "all rights reserved" though. Which it appears Flickr2Commons doesn't support. Is there any way around that or another tool I can use to import the images since they are clearly PD? Adamant1 (talk) 08:06, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

The uploader forbids the download of files, hmm. I think the only way is to download them by hand by showing all file sizes and choosing the highest available --PantheraLeo1359531 😺 (talk) 10:46, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

I know right. I hate it when people do that. I at least found a terminal program called Gallery-dl that can be used to download files from Flickr to the computer. Although it doesn't seem to retain file names which is just a hassle. But I'm in the process of downloading everything from their account lol. Hopefully someone will come up with a better solution though. --Adamant1 (talk) 12:09, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

Fingers crossed ;). Yes, it's really frustrating, especially on these questionable cases --PantheraLeo1359531 😺 (talk) 14:06, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

I have a long-standing request for Flickr2Commons to allow trusted users to upload such images. I also requested the same when Flickrpedia was in development, to no avail. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 15:23, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

• You set your default license at Flickr when you create the account, so even when you change from original photographs to scans of historical public domain images, you are probably not aware you are still getting the default license. Have you contacted them? It would be easier for them to change the license rather than you download and then reupload. You can change licenses with a single click. --RAN (talk) 15:47, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

Quality Images nomination experiment in August

I'm proposing an experiment to temporarily increase the number of Quality Image nominations allowed each day during August for active reviewers. Please see, and comment at, Commons talk:Quality images candidates. Thanks. Mike Peel (talk) 20:50, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

Die Gartenlaube: Adding an artist to an image within Wikidata

Does anyone know how to do this? See image. Everything in this German newspaper has been made un-editable by the common man. Unless, whoever is converting all these files to sole control by WD, takes responsibility for making these entries perfect, then maintenance here, is hopeless. Who, even, is doing this? Broichmore (talk) 16:47, 22 July 2024 (UTC)

@Cryptic-waveform: : your template, so you can presumably answer better than anyone else. - Jmabel ! talk 17:24, 22 July 2024 (UTC)

It looks to me like author = {{various}} is hardcoded in the template with no override possible, which I think should not be the case. - Jmabel ! talk 17:25, 22 July 2024 (UTC)

Hello. First of all I've only modified the file to use a more general template rather than a template-by-year, to remove duplicate code and differences between templates. Additionally I've also extensively documented the template.

As for the question of why, there are a lot of benefits to the current approach. It ensures that all files looks similar, link to previous and next page, and automatically link extracted images.

@Broichmore: : What change are you trying to make? I can look into making it possible. Cryptic-waveform (talk) 20:06, 22 July 2024 (UTC)

Small questions, potentially big answers.

I'm concerned with images, rather than pages.

Most of these points are covered in the existing artwork template.

Regarding engravings, We, would want to include for, the engraver/etcher, the artist of the intermediate drawing, and the author of the original sketch, photographer, painter, or sculptor.

We would want to include for caption (title), ability to augment the description. Adding translations of same.

Perhaps, issue number, page number, volume number.

Expanding on the date, if known.

Adding in depicted place or people? Place of creation? Credit line?

Flexibility on choice of License?

As to the benefits? The artwork template already makes one file look similar to another, and automatically links extracted images.

I understand? your idea for the use of templates. However, in the long term, what we need to do is have choice of license linked in some way to last or most appropiate creator. Wikidata could do that, because it contains death date, citizenship, and workplace. Broichmore (talk) 08:44, 23 July 2024 (UTC)

@Cryptic-waveform: Can we can also add, into your template, the Other versions function. Here's an example. _ Broichmore (talk) 12:13, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

The Gartenlaube, has drifted away, from how we treat newspapers of this era on the project. One thing thats needs cleaning up, is this page, and how the all date cats on it are sorted. See 1920 in particular. Can you fix?

Already Gartenlaube images suffer from very little or no content development. It's not a place for casual visitors. It's very niche, only really accessible to editors with a German background and language, and we don’t have enough of them. It's use of gothic script, and the way that artists and engravers signed work their work, makes for highly specialized work.

French periodicals, suffer from a similar lack of interested contributors, only they don’t use a difficult typeface, and they don’t have the added handicap, IMO of being Wikidata centric. Broichmore (talk) 09:10, 23 July 2024 (UTC)

To sum up, the kind of people, who can easily read the text and identify the artists are not the kind of people, that relate to, or want to be tied up in wikidata. Broichmore (talk) 09:13, 23 July 2024 (UTC)

(Preventing this from being archived while unresolved. - Jmabel ! talk 14:40, 30 July 2024 (UTC))

Optional "author" parameter added. - Jmabel ! talk 18:23, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

@Broichmore: was there some other specific change you want to this template? - Jmabel ! talk 18:27, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

Thanks for asking. Think, I've actually covered everything in 3 posts. Others may think differently.

The Artwork template covers dimensions, but I've never known it to be used for newspaper clippings, though it probably should be, if only for centerfolds, or full pages.

This Gartenlaube template may only have been in use, since November 2022? It may be a child of an earlier global Gartenlaube template from September 2007 by Joergens.mi. Other newspapers of the era, did not attract, such attention in commons, till around 2012? Since 2012, we have treated newspapers in a simpler and more accessible way by using the standard artwork template, which is easily accessible by casual visiting editors, etc. Perhaps this is what's needed here. _ Broichmore (talk) 11:21, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

Category:Videos by language

Is this category exclusively for "proper" languages or are we also allowed to put dialects and accents here? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Trade (talk • contribs) 04:59, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

"A language is a dialect with an army and a navy."

Either a dialect can be handled as a subcat (see, for example, Category:Videos in Serbo-Croatian) or directly placed in Category:Videos by language (Category:Videos in Judaeo-Spanish and Category:Videos in Leonese are not currently subcats of Category:Videos in Spanish. The latter approach seems to be the more common. (Aside: I'm very surprised that the only Hochdeutsch dialect that gets a category separate from just Category:Videos in German is Category:Videos in Yiddish. Do we have nothing else in distinct German dialects? Similarly for Italian.)

Accents, if relevant, should certainly just be subcats. - Jmabel ! talk 17:29, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

Category:Videos by accent

Category:Videos by dialect

Is there any other categories in Category:Videos by language that belongs here you think?@Jmabel: --Trade (talk) 23:31, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

What you did makes just this side of no sense to me. Among other things, Serbo-Croatian is not a dialect, it is a language that (largely for political reasons) is usually specified as "Serbian" or "Croatian" (at least theoretically two dialects, that may indeed be moving farther apart). But why would Category:Videos in Serbo-Croatian be in Category:Videos by dialect? Serbo-Croatian is certainly not a dialect.

I suppose French-accented English is a possibly interesting accent, though I've never before heard it called "French English accent". Presumably the interesting accents/dialects of English would mostly be geographical and to some extent ethnic, etc., by native speakers whose English is distinct from one another, not by non-native speakers. And in many cases I would hesitate to classify those unless someone self-identifies. The boundaries from language to dialect and from dialect to idiolect are tricky, and I'm not sure they really belong in our categorization system except where very "broad strokes" are useful. - Jmabel ! talk 01:24, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

When you said "Either a dialect can be handled as a subcat (see, for example, Category:Videos in Serbo-Croatian)" i interpreted it as you calling Serbo-Croatian a dialect Trade (talk) 02:14, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

If you had any impression that Serbo-Croatian is a "dialect" that would suggest that you are working in an area where you have very little knowledge.

No, what I meant was to look at the linked page, Category:Videos in Serbo-Croatian, which has subcats for the Serbian and Croatian languages. - Jmabel ! talk 17:00, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

an older discussion: Commons:Village pump/Archive/2023/04#Cat names of accents and dialects. RZuo (talk) 10:59, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

Library of Congress #

I appear to be using the wrong LOC number in the template here: File:G. David Schine in 1954.jpg. Can someone help me find the correct # to put in the template? RAN (talk) 16:19, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

cph.3f05899 ? -- Asclepias (talk) 16:44, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

Besides, {{Library of Congress-no known copyright restrictions}} doesn’t seem quite right for the image. --Geohakkeri (talk) 08:18, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

Nudity category

i just wrote Commons:Nudity category as a summary of a common practice. please feel free to edit it. RZuo (talk) 12:02, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

>600 TB of recent media files

The amount of data on Commons (most recent file versions) surpassed 600 Terabytes (ca. 546 TiB) recently. --PantheraLeo1359531 😺 (talk) 08:11, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

Special:MediaStatistics for verification --PantheraLeo1359531 😺 (talk) 08:12, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

Are there any reliable offline backups of the data, by the way? I think I have read somewhere that Commons data is stored on two servers or something like that, but do we have a backup that could be used if some large-scale corruption of data happened? It wouldn't take much, really: For 600 TB, about 20 LTO Ultrium 8 tapes with a capacity of 30 TB each would suffice. And such tapes could be safely stored in different places. Gestumblindi (talk) 16:54, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

@Gestumblindi We're a distribution service, so recovery and restores can be crowdsourced for less than the cost of your tapes Elizium23 (talk) 03:21, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

lmao, sure. Good luck with that project. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 08:11, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

I'd be extremely surprised if the WMF didn't have backups of all their websites. --Adamant1 (talk) 08:14, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

1. It’s more than 600tib, because this doesn’t count old and deleted versions. The same system also contains all the OTHER wikis files, so we can add that as well

2. Wikimedia Commons and wmf didn't have media backups between 2005 and 2022 (and up to 2012 there wasnt even a second server), but they finally exist.

3. As far as I know, there isn’t a public copy right now, because the deleted images would have to be filtered out. But im not 100% sure, i cant find details about it atm. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 08:32, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

It's to bad there's no way to easily create backups of specific folders on here because it would be cool if there were backups of the more important ones on somewhere like archive.org or a similar website. --Adamant1 (talk) 08:44, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

You probably read about it here I think which has more info and proposes (an) additional backup(s): Commons:Requests for comment/Technical needs survey/Media dumps.

I think it would be great if people could come to WMF with some large hard drives and get a subsection copied on them such as all files that are in use in any Wikimedia project or all files except for >1 GB video files and a large .tiff files folder.

And I don't think the amount of data by file-size is a good measure of success, e.g. there are a lot of 4K videos of the same unnotable boring event that don't get watched at at all taking up lots of storage space or many duplicate large files and so on. Instead, there probably should be greater focus on the large gaps there are, such as various specific illustrations for concepts where illustrations would be very useful. I kind of doubt there were no backups until 2022 or would consider a second server a backup. More offline backups would be good and a good way for that would be to better enable third parties to copy over things, which is also useful for many other applications. Prototyperspective (talk) 10:34, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

Backups are very crucial, and I was surprised that there were not any until 2022, also because only backupping files should not be so expensive, as they only need to be stored on several disks. --PantheraLeo1359531 😺 (talk) 10:41, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

Maybe there is a chance to establish some sort of decentral service (like Mastodon), where every instance gets maybe 10-20 TB, so files are stored in many different areas of the world, so complete data loss in one point of the world becomes more unprobable --PantheraLeo1359531 😺 (talk) 10:43, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

Maybe there could or should be some central place – like Commons:Backup or Help:Backup and/or Commons:Media dumps or a Commons WikiProject – where things like those in this thread can be discussed over longer term, people can organize or collaborate and ask questions, and there is some WMC-specific info on backups similar to wikitech:Media storage/Backups. Maybe you and @MGeog2022: could set it up and aggregate+organize all the info on this subject in one place. Prototyperspective (talk) 11:32, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

I can understand why they wouldn't want to provide a full backup of everything on their servers to the public but there really should be publicly available backups of the files that we can already access because they clearly aren't copyrighted. If nothing else just for our own purposes. There's lots of situations where I could see something like that being useful outside of just having it available if the servers ever go down. Plus like why not? Everything is already there, organized, just needs to be mass downloaded, put in zip file, and reuploaded to archive.org. Does anyone if there's an easy way to download everything in specific folders? I'm tempted to do it myself but I have no clue how to. --Adamant1 (talk) 12:17, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

600 TB or 1 PB are peanuts to the Internet Archive, as they store over 200 PB of data :) --PantheraLeo1359531 😺 (talk) 13:09, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

One does not simply just download and then upload 600 TB over the internet. At these sizes you would probably transfer via physical hard disks being handed over to someone in person. Bawolff (talk) 08:35, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

Obviously. That's why I said there shoulfd be a way download specific folders. Most of the stuff on here probably comes from Flickr anyway. So there's no reason to back it up. --Adamant1 (talk) 09:12, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

@Prototyperspective, sorry I wasn't around here last days. Yes, it would be fine to have a page with such information in Commons itself, I can create it at some moment over the next days. I agree with @Adamant1in both things: there's no reason (besides the needed technical work) not to allow mass downloading of freely licensed media files, and not all media in Commons has the same level of quality an importance, but it can be very difficult to identify all the important ones. Dumps don't need to be only one 600 TB file (in fact, much smaller Wikipedia dumps are composed of lots of files).

@Gestumblindi, yes, there are now full Commons backups in 2 datacenters. Backups were never better than they are now, and the vast majority of files were never lost over many years, but things can and should be improved even more (more copies, more places, publicly downloadable dumps). MGeog2022 (talk) 14:21, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

@Prototyperspective, @PantheraLeo1359531, I created the page Commons:Dumps and backups. MGeog2022 (talk) 13:50, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

Thank you :) --PantheraLeo1359531 😺 (talk) 14:43, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

You're welcome! Now we have all that information in Commons, without the need to collect it from here and there at Wikitech and Phabricator. MGeog2022 (talk) 15:07, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

I think the best way, if we're talking about a backup as a precaution against catastrophic data loss, is still a backup on media physically separated from any live system such as the large-capacity LTO Ultrium tapes I mentioned, which can be safely stored in different locations. Only if you have your data on tapes (or maybe large harddisks) in a vault, you can rest assured that the media / data will survive even some catastrophic large-scale event that affects whole swathes of the internet and possibly people's online / "cloud" backups as well. Gestumblindi (talk) 16:55, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

Just to clarify - the files were stored on several (geographically separated) disks prior to the 2022 point. Its not like they were on a single computer where a single disk failing would have caused the files to be lost. Generally for backup you want more than just mirroring across multiple disks - ideally you want it disconnected from the system and stored off site, so for example if the system was hacked the hacker couldn't just issue a command to delete all the files or some sort of natural disaster can't just take out the whole data center. I'm not exactly sure what the wmf backup strategy is, but my understanding is that is the part that only came into place in 2022. Bawolff (talk) 08:32, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

@PantheraLeo1359531, when I learned that there were no backups before 2021 or 2022, I was very surprised too. Fortunately, I became aware of it (and I started contributing to Commons) when there were already backups in place, so the scare was not so bad :-). But it's scary to think in what danger were all images and videos we saw in Wikipedia and other wikis. Before 2021-2022, there were (as there are now) multiple (more than just 2) copies of each media file in both main datacenters (each one stored in RAID disks), but that couldn't be called as true backups. MGeog2022 (talk) 17:01, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

Of course, a backup is absolutely needed! But now it's there :). I always have local backups of my files I contribute here, but many maybe don't, and when we take into account that some images may be out of reach to collect again, it could be a huge loss. But now we can be more relaxed :D --PantheraLeo1359531 😺 (talk) 17:06, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

+1, better safe than sorry :) --PantheraLeo1359531 😺 (talk) 19:00, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

Are 4K videos discouraged now?

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T368433

Before when I uploaded 4K videos they would be encoded and offered as a playback option. Now it only encodes up to HD and there is no option to play 4K except to play source. Example ref: File:Koayu river - summer day - 2024 July 28.webm I'm just curious if I am missing an option or doing something wrong or if something was changed in the backend? Nesnad (talk) 11:59, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

Correct. They take an enormous amount of processing power and we were getting more and more uploads. This then (multiple times) caused the transcode servers to overload to the point where all servers were tied up transcoding humongous files almost no one was watching, and never getting around to the audio files and smaller variants of the videos that are actually used. For this reason higher resolution transcodes were put on hold. This is documented in phab:T368364 and phab:T368433.

The transcode pipelines are currently being rewritten so that they can run on Wikimedia's Kubernetes platform. Once that is done, it might be easier to tweak the capacity and priority of transcoding, but that is going to take a while. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 13:56, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

It is sensible to suspend transcoding of high resolution versions, when ressources are limited. It is also sensible to annoucnce that on site. A significant number of users ignore Phabricator completely for example because it is monolingual and many people simply do not speak or read english. C.Suthorn (@Life_is@no-pony.farm - p7.ee/p) (talk) 15:28, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

Not prioritizing audio files and lower resolution videos before 4K is an absolutely bonkers design decision i gotta say Trade (talk) 03:48, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

As a very general rule: 4K video is usually overkill unless you're using a very good camera and some form of stabilization (e.g. a tripod or Steadicam, or optical image stabilization in the camera). This video looks like it was taken with a handheld camera, and it is not a good use case for 4K video; most of it is heavily affected by motion blur, so the 4K resolution is largely wasted. Omphalographer (talk) 00:24, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

Got to agree. 4K is super pointless with something like this. A lot of people can't even stream video at 4K to begin with anyway. --Adamant1 (talk) 03:59, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

Are we talking about the Western world Trade (talk) 15:07, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

I usually shoot in 4K when doing documentations, but only with fullframe camera that can profit from the high resolution, but there are several cases where 4K brings not more details than Full HD --PantheraLeo1359531 😺 (talk) 11:51, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

I must point out that the issue was not stabilization of handheld, it was the framerate. At least from what I can see from my computer. To your point, 4K is indeed useless if, and only if, it doesn't go with an above-than-avarage fps and bit rate. This is based on my experiments on YouTube -- should probably do more of such experiments here to back my claim. Miguel Angel Omaña Rojas (talk) 05:49, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia asserts that only two movies have been released on 4K Blu-Ray at 48 FPS or higher, and only a few films were shot at that speed. Most feature films are 24 FPS. 4K does need high bit rates, but FPS is irrelevant.

YouTube is not a good tool for this; there's a complex proprietary system trying to send a stream that is playable on the receiving system and maximizes quality without taking up too much expensive bandwidth. It will not replicate what will happen on Commons.--Prosfilaes (talk) 17:32, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

Good to know. I remember when people said HD was a waste because most people couldn't play it. 4K is future proofing. But I understand it was taking a lot to transcode the video. Are there plans to go back and transcode 4K video once pipelines are rewritten? Any case, thank you for the explanation guys! :) Nesnad (talk) 05:16, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

Using a higher video resolution is only "future-proofing" when there is high-resolution detail to preserve in the source video. That isn't the case here; the source video is blurred, and saving those blurry frames at a high resolution doesn't make them any less blurry. Omphalographer (talk) 05:53, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

The source video is available without limitations. Only transcoded versions with same resolution but possibly lower bitrate are not available. GPSLeo (talk) 06:07, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

This is exactly what I was talking about. It is all about the FPS numbers going along with 4K. It’s not that I’m against 4K, but when it comes to a lot of people (obviously not you) they shoot 4K in small FPS. That is what 4K is making 4K useless today. I don’t know in the future, but that whole 4K + High FPS numbers makes the files bigger, and that’s a biggie as well. Miguel Angel Omaña Rojas (talk) 22:10, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

Does framerate really matter? It's a video not a PC game Trade (talk) 04:06, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

Framerate matters for video, 30 fps can look different from 60 fps and sometimes details are not properly shown at 30. Abzeronow (talk) 21:02, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

Yes for details as @Abzeronowexplained, and also for camera movement. In a nutshell, it makes the moving imahes more real-life. Miguel Angel Omaña Rojas (talk) 20:34, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

I can bring up concerns about 4K videos at the Commons Video Meetup at Wikimania. I plan on attending the meetup in person so I'll try to remember to mention the challenges of 4K and the desire for support where appropriate. Abzeronow (talk) 00:11, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

Could you propose a way to request exceptions to the 4K "ban" for individual videos? Those in cases where the improved resolution heavily benefits. Or at the very least find a way to allow for a limited number of 4K uploads of high quality Trade (talk) 05:01, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

But no cases, where the improved resolution heavily benefits, have been presented?!? Just kill it. Alexpl (talk) 17:22, 2 August 2024 (UTC)