User talk:Andrewharris

Welcome

Welcome!

Hello, Andrewharris, and welcome to Wikipedia! Thank you for your contributions. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are some pages that you might find helpful:

The five pillars of Wikipedia
Tutorial
How to edit a page and How to develop articles
How to create your first article (using the Article Wizard if you wish)
Manual of Style

I hope you enjoy editing here and being a Wikipedian! Please sign your messages on discussion pages using four tildes (~~~~); this will automatically insert your username and the date. If you need help, check out Wikipedia:Questions, ask me on my talk page, or ask your question on this page and then place {{helpme}} before the question. Again, welcome! Kudpung (talk) 01:56, 19 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Unsourced articles - hanbury

Hi Andrewharris! An article you have created, edited, or contributed to, still has no refereces since being tagged in July 2009. As the article reads like an essay its lack of verifiable sources could suggest a blatant WP:COPYVIO which will result in the article being reduced to a one lone stub, or even deleted.. If you are able to help with these major issues please see talk:Hanbury, Worcestershire and address the various points if you can. Thanks. Kudpung (talk) 02:23, 19 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Hello

Thanks for the email and I look forward to working with you. -- PBS (talk) 09:54, 13 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I am sorry for the delay, but I have now opened my talk page as requested. Please advise the changes you suggest I should make in my article on Hanbury, Worcs, and possibly my other contributions. Andrewharris (talk) 08:13, 21 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I moved your comment to the bottom of the page as that is how it is usually done. Rather than start with Hanbury, Worcestershire I would like to start with Thomas Vernon (lawyer). If we use that article as a template you will then be free to modify the others. Is that OK with you? -- PBS (talk) 23:24, 22 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, That's fine. Sorry to be rather slow in my replies, but I've rather a lot on at present, having to write a 48 page handbook for the local Bromsgrove Festival and get it to the printers before Easter.

Andrewharris (talk) 07:58, 25 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

No worries, as there is no time constraints on us. Your create of the article Thomas Vernon (lawyer) with this edit.

The first thing done to such an article is what is called {{wikify}} it. What this means is that you edit the text and do three things. Create internal links to any other articles, add some section headings, and add a category or two. See this example

Adding intern links means that if there is a sentence fragment like this one:

"...but it was not for another 10 years that Thomas Vernon started the main rebuilding campaign that resulted in building of Hanbury Hall,..."

add [[ ]] around the desired words to be linked:

"but it was not for another 10 years that Thomas Vernon started the main rebuilding campaign that resulted in building of [[Hanbury Hall]],..."

which results in

"but it was not for another 10 years that Thomas Vernon started the main rebuilding campaign that resulted in building of Hanbury Hall,..."

Now you might wonder "but some names are not in the format I want to use", for example "Thomas Vernon (lawyer)" would look odd in a sentence. The way we deal with that is to hide the real name behind a false one by this construction <nowik>Tom Vernon</nowiki> -- notice the "|" symbol (called a pipe symbol) in the middle of the construction -- it produces Tom Vernon.

The next think is that it is generally considered good practice by this sound bite generation who make up most of the editors on Wikiepdia that articles are broken up into manageable chunks. So there should be a lead (a miniature article that sums up the rest of the article and a number of sections. If you put these in the software will automatically generate a table of contents. I added sections to Thomas Vernon (lawyer) which is done by inserting "==section name==" (without the quotes on a blank line) The software "knows" that is a section header the more "===" the greater the depth of sectioning.

The third part of wikifying an article is to add categories but we can ignore that for the moment because all three of these steps will eventually be done to an article as there are editors who specialise in this doing this sort of thing and they need to know relatively little about a subject to do it. It is just that if you have spent time writing an article you may as well do these things rather than have someone else mess it up ;-). I am now going to create a new section to discuss an area where only an expert can do the work. "===Citations===" --PBS (talk)

Citations

Some years ago there was a lot of criticism that Wikipedia articles were not accurate and untrustworthy. Which was in many cases true! The issue was addressed in an essay called Wikipedia:100,000 feature-quality articles if you read that you will see that your contributions tick most of the boxes. But they do not carry an adequate level of sourcing. They have general references, but it is not possible to tie a specific reference into any specific paragraph, and this is an area where it is difficult for another editor to do it for you.

There is a policy document called Wikipedia:Verify which has a section in it called Burden of evidence. Because this is a specialised area we are going to have to work on it to to together. Lets start with the first section in Tom Vernon which is called Early life If we take the first sentence can you please add in brackets at the end of the sentence what the reference is. -- PBS (talk) 10:30, 25 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

"Thomas Vernon was the great grandson of Rev Richard Vernon, and was descended from the Vernons of Whatcroft, who were related to the medieval Barons Vernon of Shipbrook, Cheshire (citation here). "