Wikipedia talk:Community portal

Good stuff, it really is all a bit of a maze of policies when you first arrive.  :) There should be a link to the sandbox front and center though, to encourage people to dabble (in the right place!). Should we say what creating an account involves (as little as picking a username and password, no scary commitment, and no spam, etc). The tip of the day is cute as well, we can explain the mystery of the four ~s for example.  :) /first impressions. fabiform | talk 13:40, 18 Feb 2004 (UTC)

By the way, at the top of my talk page I have a little link library I find useful. I'm sure other people do too on their userpages or in their bookmarks. Perhaps we should all nominate which we think are the most useful, and hard to find, links while editing wikipedia. I nominate: Wikipedia:Utilities, Wikipedia:Boilerplate text, Wikipedia:Writing resources, SAMPA chart for English (is SAMPA the officially favored way of producing pronunciation guides?), wiki simplified tables, Wikipedia:Extended image syntax, redirects (very mysterious when you're new!), and bad jokes. fabiform | talk 13:49, 18 Feb 2004 (UTC)

fabiform, be bold. I just was and reorginized the links and added a few. It felt good to do something I'll likely be barred from doing in a week or so when this page goes live and gets protected indefinatly. :~) Gentgeen 14:57, 18 Feb 2004 (UTC)

I am trained not to edit pages that look like the main page. But just for you, I overcame my timidity and did a bit of (minor) bold editing.  :) fabiform | talk 16:20, 18 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Just FYI, I don't think this page should ever be protected. The regular Main Page is protected only because of its high visibility.—Eloquence

I created two new sections, one for newbes, and one for the village pump seeing as these are common destinations for people not familiar with the site. What do you think? mydogategodshat 04:29, 20 Feb 2004 (UTC)

I'd prefer it to put additional emphasis on the already existing links to both.—Eloquence

But they are hard to find and give no explanation about what a village pump does. mydogategodshat 04:51, 20 Feb 2004 (UTC)

I guess it is OK to have this stuff in the introduction section as long as there is some way of really making it stand out. mydogategodshat

I also added links to related communities. I don't know if this is the best place for these links, but I think they should be somewhere on the page. mydogategodshat 04:55, 20 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Just one more thing, I don't see the Wiki-manual of style listed on the page. Do you think it should be? mydogategodshat

I think the links to the sister projects and other languages should go on the new Main Page, as they are more usefull for readers, most editors would have some idea that they exist already. Oh, and the Manual of style is in the links on the right side of the page. Gentgeen 11:38, 20 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Maybe they should go on both seeing as they are both a navagation issue and a community issue? mydogategodshat 02:28, 21 Feb 2004 (UTC)

I like this page too! There are just so many admin links that we can use now that I find it almost impossible to keep track, and this brings a lot of them into one neatly-organised place. Well done to everybody who's contributed to it so far. I think this will make a great pair of 'front pages' :) KJ 11:36, 21 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Just as a warning, Main Page/Test is gathering support to go live soon, and this page kinda goes live at the same time. Any changes/improvements need to be completed soon so we're ready. Gentgeen 17:34, 21 Feb 2004 (UTC)

I'm not sure about the term "Readers Main Page". It sets up a false dichotomy between readers and writers. It deals with navigational issues, and is useful to writers as well as readers. What is wrong with calling it the "Main Page"? mydogategodshat

Can someone change the image for the todo list into a gif with a transparent background? I don't know how the current Image:Info bulb.png renders on other browsers, but on IE it has a muddy grey background, I think it would look a lot better if it were transparent, and IE doesn't support transparent gifs. Also, re column widths, if you look in the page history we've just tried 40/60%, 45/55% and 50/50%, which do people like best. On my browser, 45/55 is best, as the content fills the two columns equally. fabiform | talk 01:12, 22 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Main Page replacement

A discusssion to replace the Main Page with Main Page/Test and Wikipedia:Main Page is currently going on at those two pages' talk pages. The current concensus is to make the change. Gentgeen 17:43, 21 Feb 2004 (UTC)

• I like what is evolving. But I foresee an upcoming conflict. It looks as though both proposed pages are intending to "Go Live" soon. We need to put together a formal selection process that allows users to discuss and vote on: 1) Keep the current version, 2) Move to the Main Page/Test version, 3) Move to the Wikipedia:Main Page version. Kingturtle 19:40, 21 Feb 2004 (UTC)

If I've understood your comment, I don't think you realise what's being planned. The current main page will be replaced by both of the two pages linked above. There's a "readers main page" which will be the default - the page that visitors see when they arrive, designed to help people use wikipedia as a resource, and also a "community main page" which will be used in parallel, designed to be useful to longterm contributors, but also to encourage people to contribute, and to help them make their first edits pain-free. Does that make sense?  :) fabiform | talk 19:59, 21 Feb 2004 (UTC)

I understand what you are saying. Still, shouldn't there be a user-wide discussion about this, and possibly a vote about this? This is a major change that will affect all users. Kingturtle 20:18, 21 Feb 2004 (UTC)

I blanketly oppose any major change of the main page until it is taken to a proper vote. Also, I'd like to say that while Main Page/Test looks good, it also looks like it's very high maintence. And Wikipedia:Main Page is just plain ugly. →Raul654 20:23, Feb 21, 2004 (UTC)

Raul, on Wikipedia we try to avoid voting unless it is absolutely necessary. We try to seek consensus first. Right now there appears to be a consensus for using Main Page/Test. You are the first person who has expressed that Wikipedia:Main Page is "just plain ugly", would you care to elaborate on the talk page?—Eloquence 00:35, Feb 22, 2004 (UTC)

Well, these replacement pages do seem to have appeared out of nowhere without any publicity. I was completely unaware of the proposed changes until this item appeared on the pump, and it looks like the proposers are getting ready to impliment them. I do have a feeling of being railroaded here. It's very easy to achieve consensus if you don't tell people something is proposed! I'm in two minds about these designs, myself. -- Arwel 01:56, 22 Feb 2004 (UTC)

It's just plain ugly. There's also not consensus on this over at the discussions - methinks you've been paying more attention to those agreeing and not paying enough attention to those saying it is worse (and needs work and similar). I've asked for a vote over there so we get some better idea for the number of people, other than those who developed it, who think it's better than what we have now. Jamesday 10:11, 23 Feb 2004 (UTC)

It's just plain ugly. Please elaborate on which parts of the page you think are "ugly".—Eloquence

How do concerned wikipedians get to know about the discussion? Is it enough with this announcement on the Village pump? Personally, I think that's much more important issue than voting or the interpretation of a voting. The community front page is a great idea, though.--Ruhrjung 22:05, 21 Feb 2004 (UTC)

We will be able to find out about discussions and polls from this page if it ever gets implemented.mydogategodshat

I am in favour of the change in theory. The split is sensible and a more visually appealing and easy to navigate front page is, I think, essential to make Wikipedia a usable resource for those people who aren't also interested in editing. The proposed main page might be high maintenance, but as I won't be someone maintaining it that doesn't bother me. I do think that any of the current maintainers should think carefully about this before agreeing to the change though.

Regarding the community page, I agree with →Raul654 in that it is horribly cluttered and likely to frighten off any new contributors almost straight away (actually, that's my interpretation of what he means by 'plain ugly'). As a regular contributor I also know that I wouldn't use it as a jump station for my common activities. It isn't ready to go live yet - don't be hasty! --HappyDog 02:37, 22 Feb 2004 (UTC)

All main pages seem ugly to me

All main pages, Main Page, Main Page/Test and Wikipedia:Main Page seem ugly to me. The reason is the use of tables which result in making the life difficult to users who have low screen resolution or doesn't like having maximised browser windows. Optim 02:33, 22 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Man I've just had about 8 edit conflicts in a row chasing this article from the Village Pump, with Optim one step ahead all the way :) -- finally got my oar in though! Anyway, regarding Optim's comments I think that in the long term Wikipedia needs to look good to a web-savvy public. This may not be an issue yet but at some point we need to be an encyclopedia for the public who want Information but don't care about contributing. Whereas most sites suffer from style over content, WP is currently a bit too far in the other direction. I'm not suggesting anything particularly flash (sic) but if you're ruling out tables then really you might as well ask for a plain text site, which is really not going to help! --HappyDog 02:43, 22 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Plain vanilla main page

See Wikipedia:Plain vanilla main page. Optim 02:54, 22 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Why this page is confused

I've been looking at this page for about 10 minutes, trying to figure out what is wrong with it, and I've realised that the problem is that we don't know what we want it to be.

If it is here for new users, to explain the site, to help then become contributors and to provide a central source of information then it is far too detailed and cluttered. It should instead focus on the common beginner questions, with headings for Getting Started, Advanced Editing and Procedures and Policies, each with a bit of text and a small set of the 3 or 4 most useful links, with maybe a link to more information... like the sections on the proposed Main Page.

If it is aimed at existing community members then it should contain some additional useful information - pages needing work, requests for assistance, current issues (e.g. New main page proposal - feedback requested) and a few carefully selected community links (e.g. village pump). It doesn't need many though, after all the side bar gives me pretty much all of the pages I currently view. Currently my Wikipedia bookmark goes straight to my watchlist. For me to use this page it would need to be at least as useful as my watchlist!

Either way, there is no use in having a massive links list as a top-level navigation page. --HappyDog 03:07, 22 Feb 2004 (UTC)

I disagree. Currently there is no way to navigate the huge jungle of links in the Wikipedia: namespace -- there is no central overview page of these links. It is only logical that Wikipedia:Main Page should provide a way to reach all pages in the Wikipedia: namespace, either through an overview page or directly. If this page is cluttered, it means that we need more overview pages, not that the approach is wrong.

I do agree that having a separate section for current issues would probably be a good idea.—Eloquence 03:11, Feb 22, 2004 (UTC)

I agree that some sort of overview pages are required, and we already have Wikipedia:Community_Information_Directory. But I strongly feel that this shouldn't be the first page people see when they come to the site (or when they go to the 'community' section if that's how it'll work). Just have a link to the full directory instead, and make the page useful in its own right - and I think there is a lot of scope for making this the first port of call, rather than your watchlist. If this was already the case then everyone would have seen this discussion, rather than a load of people (such as myself) joining it when an announcement on the Village Pump says that a concensus has already been reached! --HappyDog 03:18, 22 Feb 2004 (UTC)

I fail to see the contradiction. There's no reason why this page shouldn't have useful current information (it already has the tip of the day and the list of open tasks) and a reasonably complete directory of pages in the Wikipedia: namespace.—Eloquence 03:31, Feb 22, 2004 (UTC)

I share happydog's concern that newbies will have difficulty finding the links that they want in amongst all this clutter. However I don't think a separate Newbie Page is the answer. We could have a newbie section near the top of this page. mydogategodshat 04:18, 22 Feb 2004 (UTC)

I am wondering if the phrase "Here are some open tasks:" is needed? mydogategodshat

Yup. This is part of MediaWiki:opentask, which is also used as part of many new user welcoming messages.—Eloquence 04:22, Feb 22, 2004 (UTC)

I prefer "We would like your opinion" to "Current issues" for the same reason that I like "Things you can do" to "Articles needing attention". In both cases the former has a friendlier tone. Can the New editors section be condensed? mydogategodshat

How about "Get involved"?—Eloquence

Much better. I hate to be a pest, but what would it look like if the light bulb was slightly bigger, and in the top right hand corner of that box? mydogategodshat

On my screen the lightbulb and the clipboard are in the same vertical position -- I like that a lot. Does it look different on your screen? We can't scale up the lightbulb as it's a bitmap graphic and it would get pixelized.—Eloquence 06:38, Feb 22, 2004 (UTC)

Could we please make the lightbulb background not clash with the page background? Is it supposed to be transparent? It isn't on IE. fabiform | talk 14:58, 22 Feb 2004 (UTC)

It's transparent on Mozilla. I don't know how to make it IE-compatible. User:Brion VIBBER has done that a few times, maybe you should ask him.—Eloquence 19:03, Feb 22, 2004 (UTC)

I re-uploaded it. Is it ok now? Angela. 19:11, Feb 22, 2004 (UTC)

Ah, perfect. Thanks Angela. I asked Brion to do it yesterday (as well as the magnifying glass on the thumbnails, which is now fixed). That's what prompted all the questions about it on your talk page Eloquence.  :) fabiform | talk 20:28, 22 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Major probs with this page and IE6 and Cologne Blue skin

This page has major overlapping problems with this combination. Most people use IE6!! ChrisG

OK, I've done my best to fix this by adding some more white space. It now looks good to me in Cologne Blue using IE6 - tell me if it's still bad for you. Note to others, please don't take the extra blank lines and top-padding out; it's needed badly in the above combination.  :) fabiform | talk 02:56, 23 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Looks much better in general but still huge overlaps of text with:

• Resources and Incentives
• Frequently Asked Questions
• Boxes and Boilerplates
• Content Categorisation
• and need a little more white space above Things you can do which doesn't seem to above the column beside it.

Did people change it after your edits? Everything else is okay, though a tiny bit cramped, but that will muck up the behaviour with other browsers I imagine so I wouldn't change it anymore. ChrisG 21:07, 23 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Could you do upload a screenshot to show people who might know (better than me) how to fix it? Cheers, fabiform | talk 21:29, 23 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Problems with dual mainpage system

Just a really simple problem - but no simple solution: What is "the" wikipedia mainpage, now? I see myself mostly as a contributor at the moment, not as a reader. So the best mainpage to link to in my shortcuts would be the "Wikipedia:Main Page". But if I use this to open Wikipedia by default, I'll miss things like current news etc. I like to see. The old main page allowed both without being to cluttered (in my opinion). Now I have to chose one or the other, and that is a problem. -- till we *) 20:14, 23 Feb 2004 (UTC)

I had this same thought myself, tillwe, but I realized that in two weeks I won't even really think about it--I'll go to the "reader page" first and then jump to the "contributor" page in a couple moments if nothing strikes my fancy. So, I guess my advice would be that if we wait a week or so, we may find ways of resolving early concerns (which I have a few of, but I'm adopting the waiting stance, anyway). Jwrosenzweig 21:35, 23 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Would it help to have the Wikipedia:Main Page in the quickbar? Or is having a link from the other Main Page enough? Angela. 21:50, Feb 23, 2004 (UTC)

I think another link in the quickbar would be overkill. I have to admit I kind of like the idea of having to go through the regular Main Page first. This exposes it to much peer review.—Eloquence

I agree with Angela. I don't think it's overkill....when I want to surf to the Mailing lists page, I don't want to have to jump through the user main page every single time when all I really want is the W:MP. I'll give the Main Page plenty of peer review -- I think it would be much more efficient to add W:MP to the quickbar. I'd go so far as to say that it could replace Current Events, which I frankly have never used. I'm sure some do, but I'm suggesting it as a way of limiting how many links are in the quickbar, if that's Eloquence's concern. Jwrosenzweig 21:57, 23 Feb 2004 (UTC)

By the way, shouldn't we move the community page to Community Main Page or Wikipedia:Community Main Page? And should it be an option in our preferences which main page we want to visit when we click the wikipedia logo?

Many people would strongly disagree with removing current events (myself included). If you want it in the sidebar, we'll have to come up with a solution that 1) doesn't waste space, 2) doesn't eliminate any important links.

Regarding the title, I think Wikipedia:Main Page is great, because it is a good example for the namespace concept in action -- the same page in different namespaces has different purposes.—Eloquence

But wouldn't Wikipedia:Community Main Page work just as well for that. I find it a bit odd seeing the title of the page as "Wikipedia:Main Page" and then the first line reading "welcome to the Community Main Page" we normally repeat the article title in bold. fabiform | talk 22:27, 23 Feb 2004 (UTC)

I knew suggesting CE was a bad move...well, frankly I don't think one more link will hurt. I know I'd find it useful, especially if I'm accessing from slower dialup...sometimes waiting for a page to load with several thumbnails (like the Main Page) is annoying. I like the title Wikipedia:Main Page and agree that it is exactly what namespace is supposed to do. In summary, I don't think adding Community Main (or however we can shorten the name acceptably to make it fit the quickbar) "wastes space"....frankly I think it a very good use of space. After all, we expect that contributors will use WP:MP more often than MP, simply because WP:MP navigates to more useful pages -- if that's why we had a link to the one MP in the past, I don't see why linking to both MPs (now that they've separated) is a "waste". Just my 2 cents, Jwrosenzweig 22:07, 23 Feb 2004 (UTC)

J, I agree that such a link would be useful. I'm concerned, however, that it might make part of the sidebar invisible in the lower resolutions. This is especially problematic when the sidebar is in "floating" mode (a user preference), where you can't scroll to see the parts which are invisible. With the sysop links the vertical sidebar is already pretty huge. I really think we're on the limit in terms of vertical length.

Something like Main Page (2) would work space-wise, but be rather unintuitive.

Caching problems didn't allow me to see the answers ... argh. Anyways, I'd like a dual Mainpage link in the sidebar, but maybe Main Page / W:MP would be more intuitiv. -- till we *) 22:43, 23 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Hey, here's an idea. How about making the logo point to the community main page, and the Main Page link to the regular one?—Eloquence 22:13, Feb 23, 2004 (UTC)

I like that idea, but I think the other way round would be more intuitive. People expect the logo to link to the Main Page, and the Main Page is still more of the main page than the Community Main Page is, so I think the logo should point there. Angela. 22:41, Feb 23, 2004 (UTC)

I agree, it's a good idea. But it should be the way round that Angela suggests, it's definately more intuitive (for me, at least). fabiform | talk 22:45, 23 Feb 2004 (UTC)

I think the best idea would be to make it a user option 'Main Page links to Community Page', defaulting to no for new users, but customisable for those of us who more often want to go to the community page. The graphic should, I think, always go to the Main Page, but this could either be controlled from the same setting or from a different setting if that is more useful to others. --HappyDog 23:25, 23 Feb 2004 (UTC)

I like a link in the left-hand sidebar; you can tell I like it because I suggested it right at the beginning for the new main reader's page design. :-) "If we added a sidebar link under Main Page to Contributors' Page Contributor Help or some such, I could still get there with just a click. " (I, also, have never used the Current events link until just this moment to see what it did.) Elf 00:24, 24 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Tip o' the day.....or Tip o' the week

Do we have people willing to change this everyday? Maybe it should be weekly? Kingturtle 23:51, 23 Feb 2004 (UTC)

I have plenty of tips. I think I can handle it. We'll see.—Eloquence

Why is this page called Main page rather than Community Main Page? It is confusing with two Main pages. 152.163.252.195