Wikipedia talk:2014 main page redesign proposal/Archive 1

Advertising

This seems like a great idea. Finally there might be movement. Could I ask whether it will be promulgated in arenas where we're likely to attract the attention of professional web designers? Tony (talk) 11:27, 15 July 2012 (UTC)

I think success depends on engaging professional web designers (of which some are Wikimedians), and media exposure. Assuming that the community agrees with this proposal, we should write a blog post for the Wikimedia Foundation blog, etc. John Vandenberg ^(chat) 15:01, 15 July 2012 (UTC)

Have you considered a straight press release, too? Tony (talk) 15:41, 15 July 2012 (UTC)

Needs Resource list

What content blocks are being embedded? We could provide [...] -- Quiddity (talk) 08:13, 3 August 2012 (UTC)

(Done, see #Content blocks list. If designers create reusable (non-styled) content blocks, they can list them in the "proposed additions" section, so that content and layout can (hopefully) be cleanly separated in our discussions. -- Quiddity (talk) 04:37, 4 August 2012 (UTC)

Needs Criteria

High profile web designers will want a list of criteria, that is more exact than "[must] include the majority of the content blocks that are part of the current main page". (That's the only design-criteria currently given)

Actually we all want that; I can find dozens of quotes in the 2008/09 redesign, explaining that it all went wrong because there was no criteria, just an "open competition", and that "change for the sake of change accomplishes nothing". —Quiddity (talk) 23:11, 18 September 2012 (UTC)

Definitions and goals

What can be changed? Everything.

From small to large scale:

1. Fixes

   (Minimal tweaks. Remove a couple of outdated links, update a few small things.)

2. a Re-Style (+Fixes)

   (Same basic Layout and Content, but change the look. eg The Anome's and most of the current submissions and 2008 submissions and 2006 alternatives.)

3. A major Overhaul

   (Complete layout and content re-examination. Add a few components, Remove a thing or two. Re-arrange it all. Expect a large list of sub-threads discussing each aspect, for months. - eg Pretzels' and fr:Wikipédia:Accueil principal and Cacycle's and old Italian style and current Italian style and Wintran 8's and Deathgleaner's, etc)

4. Utterly Different

   (Tabula rasa. eg HenkvD's and WP:Teahouse, and what many outside professionals would give us.)

We won't all agree. -- The folks that yearn for #4 are going to be terribly dissatisfied if we end up with Just #1. Some of us are open to all possibilities (1–4), and some may be leaning towards just changing a single aspect ("I'll support any design that includes [x]!"). It needs to be solidly stated, that we're officially open to anything. Conversely, it needs to be understood, that each change will come with resistance. However, at the very least, we can put any good (completed) ideas in the Main Page alternatives listing.

1. is easy. 2 & 3 are overlapping and long/hard/frustrating. 4 requires a stroke of genius (box outside thinking) or herculean effort.

Different designers will naturally approach this project from different angles, just as our readers all arrive from different angles (perspectives, expectations, desires, etc). A problem in the last 2 redesigns, was proposal-proliferation. We need some way(s) to minimise conflict between the designers who are reaching for different goals, AND coordinate the designers who are working towards a shared goal. Possibly the above definitions will help.

TL;DR: Decide on any content changes first. Then move on to design/layout/style changes. Because both at once, in 30 competing designs = SNAFU of confusion and apathy. -- Quiddity (talk) 09:19, 3 August 2012 (UTC)

What happened in 2008?

The page Wikipedia:2008 main page redesign proposal is useless. All the good stuff is in the history. Is there a better link for readers wanting to understand what happened in 2008, and why it failed? If not, the 2008 page needs overhauling so that it is informative. At the very least it should have a note at the top to explain what happened.

The only Wikipedia:Signpost coverage I can find is Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2008-07-07/News and notes; merely a note that the project had start.

There was a note at Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)/Archive 29#New Main Page design, Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)/Archive 34#Wikipedia:2008 main page redesign proposal, and Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)/Archive 46#2008 main page redesign.

There was an RFC at Wikipedia talk:2008 main page redesign proposal/Survey, and a straw poll at Wikipedia:2008 main page redesign proposal/straw poll 2008-10-18. What happened after that? Nothing?

John Vandenberg ^(chat) 15:17, 15 July 2012 (UTC)

Did you look at the talk page and its archives? Seems to be a fair bit there: Wikipedia talk:2008 main page redesign proposal. Or do you mean the actual designs themselves? Also, as well as working out why the 2008 process failed, maybe look at why the 2006 process worked, and also look at the 2011 RfC. Those are the three main bits of history that may need summarising, or maybe just plough ahead and hope for the best. The key is to have several people with the clue, time, and diplomacy to keep something like this going for the 3-6 months it will probably take. Carcharoth (talk) 16:34, 15 July 2012 (UTC)

Yes, you should also see Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Main Page features regarding the 2011 discussions. IMO, one of the key factors why these proposals failed to gain consensus is the scope of all the proposed changes. Modifying the layout, colours, and aesthetics to improve web usability is one thing. But when the discussions turned to changing the content, and adding or removing main page sections, that's where disagreement seemed to really increase (like in these 2011 polls, where, among others, adding featured portals or good articles to the Main page failed to gain consensus). I think the reason why 2006 was successful was that the primary goal was on improving the web usability and accessibility, while in 2008 and 2011 the discussions were all over the place. And as Carcharoth mentioned, someone will have to keep this active for several months and not have it die out. Zzyzx11 (talk) 02:45, 17 July 2012 (UTC)

Something to note

Whatever we end up deciding upon, it should be able to fit seamlessly into the new Athena interface that the higher-ups are developing. Kevin Rutherford (talk) 18:07, 17 July 2012 (UTC)

Before the last redesign?

If there's a screenshot or something of the Main Page before the last redesign, could that be added to the Project page? It'd be interesting to see the before and after for historical reference. --Philosopher ^{Let us reason together.} 22:46, 17 July 2012 (UTC)

There are some screenshots at Wikipedia:Main page history. If you look at the categories of those images, you can probably put together a gallery and (be bold!) add it to the page. Carcharoth (talk) 05:55, 18 July 2012 (UTC)

The local archive seems to have started somewhat later than I wanted, and the Internet Archive doesn't seem to include images in its archives. Oh, well. --Philosopher ^{Let us reason together.} 15:40, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

Try this Internet Archive snapshot and also Wikipedia:Main Page alternative (Classic 2006) (use the classic skin to view it!) (and even the 2004 version). -- Quiddity (talk) 07:37, 3 August 2012 (UTC)

First hack at a streamlining of the main page

Following the theme of incremental, rather than radical redesign, I've reworked the current main page a bit at User:The Anome/Main Page experiment. The design owes a lot to the recent Wikipedia Signpost redesign, but I hope in a good way: I wanted to get the same sort of clean feel. All the text, and most of the layout, is identical, with the main changes being:

• mixing serif and sans-serif fonts to distinguish frame and content
• removal of all the pastel colors
• rules instead of borders
• replacement of the box at the top with a newspaper-style "masthead"

This isn't a finished web design. It doesn't yet degrade gracefully with different page widths, and I've broken the layout a bit, so you'll have to change the width of the page in and out to make the headings "Today's featured article" and "In the news" line up horizontally, and there's no attempt to make it work on any browsers other than modern browsers like Firefox etc. but otherwise it works as intended.

Let me know what you think!

-- The Anome (talk) 01:16, 20 July 2012 (UTC)

Reminds me of the print version of the Wall Street Journal. Seems professional. Not sure if I particularly like that specific serif font, but a serif font is a nice change. It looks clean, simple, probably needs some refinement, and wouldn't hurt to develop some subtle images to use as 'cues', but honestly the general idea of 'strong subtlety' is the exact right approach. -- Avanu (talk) 01:54, 20 July 2012 (UTC)

Thanks! It's only a first hack, and a lot could be done to improve it. If anyone wants to pick it up and improve it further, I'd be delighted. -- The Anome (talk) 02:05, 20 July 2012 (UTC)

I'd like to see the "Other areas of Wikipedia" section cut so that the "Sister projects" section is given more prominence. Albacore (talk) 20:47, 20 July 2012 (UTC)

It looks very nice! I agree with Albacore, though - it mostly duplicates the content in the sidebar anyway. --Philosopher ^{Let us reason together.} 15:27, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

Maybe the only incremental superfluous redesign can fly. (But see my radical proposal below.) I participated in the last redesign effort and that's the feeling I have. To tell the truth, I don't like the new design, since I guess I didn't like the old one :) I mean, for instance, what major website says "welcome" nowadays. -- Taku (talk) 14:37, 22 July 2012 (UTC)

More whitespace?

If there was more whitespace in the ITN, OTD, and DYK sections, it might make it feel even less crowded. I think this could be achieved by simply adding more space between the entries in those sections, though perhaps less than a full <br> would add. --Philosopher ^{Let us reason together.} 15:51, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

We need a new vision!

I made a similar proposal last time. It didn't fly and I doubt it will fly this time. But allow me to repeat it. The closest thing to the design I want to propose is a news website like nytimes. Thus, the main page should consist of major pieces at the top; namely, featured article/featured picture in our case and, below, we should have sections for each subject matters; like history, geology, science, sports, people, politics, and last but not least fashion!. Maybe we can let relevant wikiprojects decide which articles they want to put on each section. In a way, this will be much expanded "did you know" except that these articles don't have to be new. We will also put the "on this day" in the place where you can find advertisement in the newspaper website; like on the right sidebar. At the very bottom we can have some community related stuff like major recent afd or rfc. Does the proposal make sense? -- Taku (talk) 15:03, 22 July 2012 (UTC)

An example of good design on Wikipedia

See Wikipedia:Teahouse. Is that look adaptable into the main page? 169.231.53.116 (talk) 03:13, 23 July 2012 (UTC)

Good articles

This was initially brought up (by me) at Talk:Main page#good articles. Can a redesign consider something along the lines of "Wikipedia has 39,632 Good articles. You can view them all here." or "Read a random Good article". I would be supportive of any solution someone could think of that allowed our good articles to be shown on the main page. Ryan Vesey Review me! 18:19, 24 July 2012 (UTC)

Remove all featured content

If we're going to discuss changing the main page, then let's discuss removing the so-called "featured content".

I've long felt that the main page should not include our so called "featured content". It gives the false impression that Wikipedia is "done" (a mostly completed project). I think the main page should have some random page, with a note that Wikipedia is a work in progress, and please join in and help.

I understand that this mindset started for a couple reasons: That we want to show what we feel is the best that we feel that Wikipedia has to offer. (And as such was also a symptom reinforced by the Wikipedia 1.0 project.) And also (not as "officially") as a sort of award system to help motivate people to contribute: "you too could have "your page" displayed on the main page".

Setting aside that this helps reinforces WP:OWN, this is reinforcing the idea that Wikipedia is an socially inclusionistic "completed" project.

We constantly have newbies who feel that they aren't 'allowed" to edit featured articles. Reinforced by rollbackers who revert unsourced contributions as "vandalism". Which, by the way, is absolutely contrary to the Wiki-way". One person adds info, and others help develop the info, including sourcing it. The featured content process of "former featured content" causes people to not want to allow any edits to "their page", out of fear. Fear that the star on their user page may need to be removed due to allowing others to share in editing. For fear that those edits may be seen as "substandard" by some FAC reviewer.

So we would be MUCH better served by placing some random unfinished page on the main page, telling all comers that they truly can edit this page.

Having said all of this, I am dubious that this will happen. I think the reward mentality reinforcement of the FAC process is too firmly ingrained in the mind-set of Wikipedians for it to change. Even if it eventually kills the project...

Shrugs, but then, I still believe that someone should speak up, even if they are the lone voice, even if they may be accused of being foolish, or of "tilting at windmills".

YMMV, of course, but then, that's one of the oft-overlooked strengths of Wikipedia, the divergence of opinion is one of the things which helps bring us toward neutrality.

Happy building... - jc37 18:59, 24 July 2012 (UTC)

What would you think about giving DYK a more prominent position and keeping, but reducing in prominence, Featured Articles? I do think that it's important to showcase what an article can be - otherwise, editors may never see a FA-class article and, more to the point, not know how to go about creating one. (I know, I'm not one to talk, since I've never made one, but ... ) That said, if DYK articles were described differently, it could be a good source of "articles you can just jump in and improve" for the main page. --Philosopher ^{Let us reason together.} 14:57, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

I'd prefer a "featured content portal", which had an explanatory link from the main page. Or rather, even better than that, we could replace the cycling through of FC to be a cycling through of portals on the main page. Each portal tends to list all the related featured content. (Though some are better than others obviously.) It also could serve to revitalise the various community portals. (And maybe even help people find WikiProjects of their interest.)

As for DYK, I'm of two minds on it. On one hand, anything which helps entice people to look at new pages (and thus give the opportunity to help edit) sounds like a decent idea. But the DYK process has so much become a "counting" process. How many DYKs has such n such person created? It's not as bad as some things, but it's still an example of "Wikipedia the video game".

Anyway, sure. DYK should be nearer to the news section, if only due to similarity in intent - being informative. - jc37 18:02, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

Moving right away from the traditional look

I think the Teahouse is a good example of how all pages could be made generally more appealing. It's time now however to exploit and incorporate more of the features of modern web design. Breaking away even more from the traditional look, I would encourage designs on the basic concept of the Athena project. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 03:20, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

I also think the Featured Article is essential. It helps to demonstrate what Wikipedia articles should look like, and encourage users to make better pages as their first creations. I'm less concerned with 'ownership' issues of GA and FA, and I'm sure that the new landing page for new users that is to be developed soon will help address many issues. --Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 03:26, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

Please, no! The Teahouse is ... a graphical nightmare. I'll grant that the current Main Page isn't that great, but at least we avoid all of the glaring colors, unreadable (shadowed or outlined) text, and gratuitous images. Besides the aesthetics, remember that some people have bad eyesight! (I have glasses, but the text at the Teahouse has literally made me wonder if I need to get my prescription checked - before I realized that it was intentional blurring.) --Philosopher ^{Let us reason together.} 15:24, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

The Teahouse is very hard on my eyes. The text remains in focus for me, but the low contrast causes eye fatigue to set in very quickly. Those types of changes should be confined to skins, because they are a matter of preference. As far as the functional changes of Athena, it's very unfortunate that that type of change tends to stay confined within skins. It's an absolute waste of organization to use skins to contain features and to blithely ignore skins when choosing colour schemes. Skins are for graphical changes, not functional changes. Users are forced to settle for uncomfortable schemes, forsake features, or learn how to modify their own CSS to compensate. BigNate37_(T) 06:47, 8 August 2012 (UTC)

Location-aware front page

I think it would be interesting to have a front page that is "location aware" where the web browser provides this information. If the user has provided location information, the front page could include a block which lists Wikipedia articles that are 'near' where the user is located. See https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/geolocation/ . (The article location aware doesn't cover this.) John Vandenberg ^(chat) 00:17, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

This is standard web design technology based on the site visitor's IP location. However, I don't immediately see any real advantage in it here. Like me, many regular editors are quite widespread around the globe, and the readers of the English Wikipedia in particular even more so. I'm not sure that readers hitting the front page would necessarily wish to be channeled immediately to areas of geographical interest. Some stats may already have been gathered concerning the locations of visitors to the front page, but I wouldn't know offhand where to look for them (MediaWiki perhaps?). --Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 01:36, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

Hmm; good question. If it isnt somewhere, geographic stats for the Main_Page could be added to http://reportcard.wmflabs.org/ fairly easily. John Vandenberg ^(chat) 08:54, 27 July 2012 (UTC)

Comparing redesign proposals

We've already got 6 proposals, and there will surely be more. Can we please think about how to better compare them? I suggest

1. on the main page, each proposal gets a line of textual description
2. the creator takes a screenshot, so that we can have a thumbnail of that for visual side-by-side impressions.

Rd232 ^talk 14:01, 2 August 2012 (UTC)

Tips and Hints idea.... and sooo much more!!

Using a "tips and hints" idea as a case study, on the talk page for the Main Page, I started a discussion about the main page, and the editor-reader relationship. My views on this topic cause me to imagine a very different vision for the page than what it does have now. A better main page. The discussion at Talk:Main Page/Archive_169#Tips and Hints idea sees this look into what the main page should actually be *about* in some detail, but there is so much more to talk about, and i think the conversation needs to be given the spark of life. Input from you would be very insightful and helpful. So far (in many cases) on this in this redesign proposal, we have been discussing very minimal changes. I however see a page with a radical new look that is much more suited to the newbies, but will be assessable to everyone, with little nuggets of info to help people on their wiki-journey. Perhaps one thing will catch a browser's eye one day, and make them go "wow, that's really interesting and cool... hmm i wonder if i *can* make a difference*...." See the link for all this in more detail.

Thanks in advance for your responses. :) --Coin945 (talk) 04:07, 3 August 2012 (UTC)

I advice you to create your own redesign. HenkvD (talk) 18:24, 3 August 2012 (UTC)

My own... redesign?? But.. but... I can't draw very well. I cant put the technical info into websites to alter their appearance. My point is about changing the content within the main page. I want to change the layout of the page, not the actual design of the page itself. Sure, let's change it, but that's not my business to meddle in. So my "redesign", I take that means: come up with a plan of where/how the different sections would be arranged? What if I just listed some ideas and then we work out where the best place to put them would be?--Coin945 (talk) 03:38, 4 August 2012 (UTC)

See above for several radical proposals. -- Taku (talk) 18:59, 3 August 2012 (UTC)

How do I become an editor? she asked

Not sure where the best place for this little anecdote is, so I'll put it here. Somehow Wikipedia came up in conversation today and I asked my friend if she'd ever considered becoming an editor. She had, as a matter of fact. Some months ago she thought it might be fun to start contributing. So she tried to look for tutorials, how-to guides, basic policy guidelines, and so on, but was put off by how difficult Wikipedia was to navigate. She just got lost in the labyrinth of walls-of-text and arcane policies. Before she even created a username, she threw her hands up and said "fuck it".

With this in mind, I went to the main page after our conversation to look for information aimed at would-be editors who want to get started. Eventually I found a link to Wikipedia:Introduction, cunningly (and ironically?) hidden in "the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit". I wonder if the main page should prominently display some clearly named link (e.g. How to become an editor or Start contributing or whatever) which leads to a friendly how-to guide like Wikipedia:Introduction. Braincricket (talk) 23:21, 3 August 2012 (UTC)

I like it. It's a good invitation to edit, but it doesn't take away from the seriousness of the main page. Ryan Vesey 23:23, 3 August 2012 (UTC)

I see it was already discussed last year in this RFC. Braincricket (talk) 00:00, 4 August 2012 (UTC)

Good idea. That's something the French Wikipedia has been doing on its main page, since December 2009. At the french home page, the right side of the page contains a brief description of what Wikipedia is, who writes it, how to join, and some info about the community. Dodoïste (talk) 07:57, 4 August 2012 (UTC)

Ah, I see the Italian home page adopted the same design as French Wikipedia since 2011. They also describe the project and how to edit on the main page. Dodoïste (talk) 10:29, 5 August 2012 (UTC)

I'd go a step farther and add it in the Interaction sidebar (at MediaWiki:Sidebar), which shows up on every page, titled "How to edit". --Philosopher ^{Let us reason together.} 21:47, 4 August 2012 (UTC)

Sounds like a very good idea, Philosopher : ) - jc37 21:24, 16 August 2012 (UTC)

• I made some suggestions here ("Wikipedia user interface and helping new users") that might be of interest—on how Wikipedia search could be greatly improved to display, alongside search results, "advertisements" that invite users to create accounts, learn how to edit, help patrol for vandals etc. LittleBen (talk) 12:55, 3 September 2012 (UTC)

Request for design feedback from Pretzels

I've thrown together a first draft of my submission, and would love to hear any feedback or comments. Thanks, — Pretzels ^Hii! 16:34, 4 August 2012 (UTC)

• Some very interesting ideas in there. I particularly like some of the refinements to the "On this day..." section, and the addition of the "About Wikipedia" section (though radical changes beyond what you've suggested, would be requested (removing the confusing photograph, debating each and every link, etc etc)).
• I'm not sure if you're suggesting that we reduce the average size of the TFA summary by half? (your Gwen Stefani summary has 80 words, today's Song Thrush summary has 170 words). Would the design still work with 170 word average? Maybe if you used the regular size font?
• Does that POTD section still work with a portrait-oriented image?
• Using allcaps for the section-headings will be a hard-sell - suggest changing those.
• I don't think the "Popular today: [...]" section will work. Too easy to hack - every troll and SEO would be trying to get their choice onto the Main Page via click inflation.

HTH. -- Quiddity (talk) 21:15, 4 August 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for your feedback - you make some really interesting points.

• The About Wikipedia section's content is definitely placeholder - the aim of this section should be primarily to encourage readers to try editing, and secondarily to help users find out about the project more quickly. Clearly the copy and link lists don't reflect this at present, and whilst this is mainly a design idea I'd more than welcome revisions to that text / link lists.
• I have shortened the TFA blurb deliberately; this helps alleviate the "wall of text' impression the current main page gives, and pushes readers to click-through to the actual article for more. If there is strong opposition to this the blurb could remain longer.
• I envisage a few different layouts for the POTD section to fit other aspect ratios / other featured media, etc. Obviously a landscape image will always fit better on landscape displays, but this is not a design limitation.
• The all-caps helps reduce the size of the headers whilst remaining legible, giving more prominence to the content. I realise this is not "house style" but feel it's appropriate in the context.
• This is one to experiment with - the only new content I have added to the page. The data is calculated here. I understand the concerns about gaming, but we can only really find out by trialling it. I think the combination of only updating the list daily, along with the sheer number of pageviews one would have to amass artificially, should make it difficult enough to game. We have the option of using the biggest pageview increase or total pageviews here.

Thanks again, — Pretzels ^Hii! 21:50, 4 August 2012 (UTC)

Well done! Bravo! That's the very first time I look at a main page design for Wikipedia and have the feeling it is professional. We have a real design here. It has a clear and usual structure, it makes a good uses of spaces (Wikipedia tends to be too cluttered), it feels attractive. Of course several things could be improved, but it's such a drastic improvement that it could be adopted right away on my opinion. Here is some improvements I would suggest:

• The "popular today" section is a bad idea. It tells users that they should read these articles "because lots of people read it too". It is not related to the interest of the reader himself.
• Reducing the average size of the TFA summary by half is a good idea, it was too long to be efficient. I suggest reducing the number of links in order to reduce distraction and overwhelming choice of destinations.
• Regarding design, why the choice of the "Times New Roman" typeface for the Wikipedia heading? I'm not a designer, but I know it has the reputation of being a pooly designed typeface that does not deserve its fame. I don't know which typeface works on the web, but would it be possible to use something like a Garamond? Or the Gill Sans used in the Wikimedia Foundation logos?
• Why not allcaps, it works in short headings. But I believe the "letter-spacing:2px" is not ideal. It seems to me that it reduces scannability. I'm not sure, and I have no reference to back this up. That's just how I feel.
• Please ask for advice on how to make this pages accessible to users with disabilities, at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Accessibility.

And good job again! Dodoïste (talk) 17:20, 5 August 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for checking it out, and for your detailed feedback! You are right, the header font needs to be updated - that part was put together before Vector and the new Wikipedia logotype were implemented. It should be set in Linux Libertine, like the Wikipedia wordmark. Accessibility is largely an issue to consider if this was coded for the main page (the current code is a mess, it's purely for mockup purposes). Thanks again!v — Pretzels ^Hii! 12:16, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

Pretzels I think you have (once again) created a fine entry for redesign.

• I like the clean, minimalism of your entry.
• Only the featured page is thumb with caption; I would suggested removing this to be consistent.
• I actually like the popular today section. It is kind of like random article, in that you would look at something you normally wouldn't. Moreover, I feel like it could help point editors to pages that have heavy traffic, ensuring quality control of these pages.

--88wolfmaster (talk)

Thanks! I agree the "popular today" list is a valuable addition. It had support in a previous RfC. I'm not certain either way on the featured article's image caption... — Pretzels ^Hii! 12:16, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

Yes! The first redesign proposal I've ever seen that makes me just go Yes!. I particularly like the About Wikipedia section. Rd232 ^talk 22:15, 8 August 2012 (UTC)

Thanks Rd232, you made me smile! I'm so glad you like it! — Pretzels ^Hii! 12:16, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

---

I made an alternative version (before read this section) : User:Nouill/sandbox (my English is bad) Few differences :

• Less contrast between the section.
• More space for the right section (I think it is easily to read this section now)
• Deletion of the three list of links (The important links are already more accessible in the left menu, the others doesn't have to be put on highlight.)
• Deletion of the "Popular today" (redundant with the news, it could be a problem with polemic/sexual/anecdotal contents)
• Deletion of the "Contents · A - Z index · Categories". There are too visible, relative of their utilities.
• Put the "Donate section", in the same module of the others sections
• Move the About section (I think the picture isn't enough related with the rest of content, and the lack of link in the text is not a good idea for me)
• Deletion of the caption in the feature section, it is not coherent with the other picture.

It isn't perfect, but I think is better. :) --Nouill (talk) 23:15, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

Cool! Thanks for checking out my proposal. It was interesting to see your revisions, but you removed some of my favourite aspects so I won't be making these changes to my page :) — Pretzels ^Hii! 12:16, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

Hello Pretzels,

Yes, it looks nice. There's plenty of white space along the margins, which is good for a less crowded appearance. Since you are looking for feedback, here are a few points:

• Most featured articles have a much longer blurb than is shown here. That might play havoc with your layout.
• When the browser is narrow (at 1/2 the width of my display screen) the right-hand column extends well past the bottom of the left-hand column, giving it an unkept appearance. But it's okay in full-screen mode and I guess that's becoming the de facto standard.
• I'm not a big fan of uppercase titles because it looks a little too much like SHOUTING. Perhaps it might be slightly better to use Small-Caps? Or, well, maybe not. Perhaps instead a bold face or a graphical gradient background?[1]
• The image of the day box doesn't quite fit in with the remainder of the layout. I guess the look you're going for there is one of the old-style photo albums? But the white text on a dark background causes it to stand out prominently instead of blending in, and the left margin makes it appear improperly aligned. Perhaps if the text were inside the black border but used black text on an off white background (like a label)?

Thank you. Regards, RJH (talk) 16:12, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

• Thanks RJH! The featured article blurb is indeed shorter, but this is deliberate for the design to be effective. I think a shorter blurb would increase clickthroughs. You're right about the resizing - as this is a mockup the code is only rough and doesn't adjust well to small screens. The dark image of the day unit is intended to bring out the colours in the image, and make it stand out more - glad it's working! — Pretzels ^Hii! 18:04, 25 August 2012 (UTC)

• Copying Munaf's feedback from my talk page, cos I think it's more relevant here :)

Hey! I'm a UX Designer at WMF and I sit with Maryana. I'm also working on some redesigns of my own (unreleased thus far). I think this is a good start, and definitely one of the better redesigns I've seen submitted. The Picture of the Day is well-styled, and I'm digging the "Timeline" view for anniversaries. My personal preference is that "In the News" should be more prominent than "Best of Wikipedia" - perhaps swapped in positioning and restyled accordingly (with a less prominent border as well). I do like that you used contrasting typefaces (Georgia with sans-serif). I think you could probably do that a bit more to create some content hierarchy - perhaps by using Georgia for section headings and sans-serif for content. One other thing that jumps out is that the "Did you know" section could be more scannable. One thing that might make those bullet points more appealing to read is not starting with the classic "..." even though that's the pattern we use today. All in all - I like it! Please keep it up.

• Thanks Munaf! I really appreciate you taking the time to look over my design. I've revised Did You Know a little based on your feedback; I think it's clearer now. I agree content hierarchy is key - that's exactly what the Main Page is missing right now. — Pretzels ^Hii! 18:04, 25 August 2012 (UTC)

I'm not a designer, so I won't even pretend to know what I'm talking about on that front – I just think it looks way cleaner and more modern, and the sidebar for "In the news" and "On this day" is great. From a general concept standpoint, what I absolutely love is the idea of featuring a photo of an actual Wikipedian (it could even be a rotating template, like the one that we're using on our Editor engagement info page...) on the Main page, and generally making it more clear for readers that these articles haven't just appeared out of the ether or some Google-sponsored think-tank. That's a critical element that the current design is lacking, which I think is exacerbating the general lack of knowledge about the Wikimedia movement and negatively affecting new editor participation.

Thanks, Pretzels, for your work on this! Maryana (WMF) (talk) 17:55, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

• Thanks so much Maryana! I agree, getting visible faces to represent WP editors is vital. Be sure to let me know if you think of anything else! — Pretzels ^Hii! 18:04, 25 August 2012 (UTC)

Pretzel's design is by far the best so far. Has a lot of strengths, the more striking header, larger photograph and right alignment and the gold text especially I like but would extend it to include Good articles. I also believe that an A-Z index should be considered an important link for an encyclopedia as with Pretzel's central placement, regardless of how wikipedia search engine and interlinking funtions. Something more like that would be better, get rid of those pastel headers for a start! Yes, wiki foundation designers take note, and use his design as a starting point, something along those lines is what I also envisage. You might want to check out the Encyclopedia Iranica website which I think has some nice colour schemes at least, the gold text looks classy. Gold, midnight blue, silver and white hues look the best for an encyclopedia in my opinion. ♦ Dr. Blofeld 20:41, 16 August 2012 (UTC)

• Thanks Dr Blofeld - your comments are very much appreciated. The Iranica website is nice - perhaps we should be using more colour and contrast on en.wiki. — Pretzels ^Hii! 18:04, 25 August 2012 (UTC)

The design looks nice. But let's find a different way to say "best of Wikipedia". "Best" is very subjective, and for that matter is vague as to why it is best. - jc37 21:23, 16 August 2012 (UTC)

• I'm glad you like the design. I've used this header because "Today's featured article" doesn't mean anything to readers; for those unfamiliar with the featured article process, it could be a random article. Best of Wikipedia makes it clear that this is one of WP's best articles. I don't see it's subjective; the Featured Content homepage describes it as "the best that Wikipedia has to offer". — Pretzels ^Hii! 18:04, 25 August 2012 (UTC)
• Like everybody else, I think Pretzels has captured something here. Something that says, "This is Wikipedia." Great job, Pretzels. 64.40.57.84 (talk) 02:46, 29 August 2012 (UTC)

Comments on Pretzels's and Nouill's versions.

Apologies for not having read the comments above. Well done to both editors, especially Pretzels, who came up with the visuoconceptual basis. Both versions are better than what we currently have. In both, I've been bold/rude by removing all wikilinks but for those to articles that have actually gone through the main-page quality checks, and links to other structural parts of the project. This has been a bone of contention with the current main page for some time: all of the hard work by the forums seems to be diluted by inviting visitors to click on other links, bypassing them; yet virtually all of the links in the main page forum spots are prominently displayed in the prepared articles. (The exception is the featured pic, of course.)

Here are my opinions on strengths and weaknesses. First, Pretzels's:
PRETZELS'S:

• Cluttered effect. There's still too much text. I know there are vested interests who will whine if their real estate entitlement is reduced, but one has to bite the bullet. I very much like the smaller entree to the FA lead that you've chosen: that problem is solved in your proposal; but the ITN and OTD to the side, plus DYK, are all due for rationing; the only way to avoid the cluttered effect is to have more white space. Suggest rationing DYK, OTD, and ITN down to three items each; maybe four for ITN, unsure.
• Pic sizes: the FA pic of Stefani is just large enough to avoid the squintiness of the currently ridiculous thumb-tinies. Sorry to be superficial, but web-pages we compete with make much better use of pics, which are typically larger than the FA one. I can imagine that many FA pics are more detail-rich and would need to be larger. The ITN and OTD pics are gobsmackingly tiny here. Please either remove them or allow one to sit at the top of each forum, larger ... MUCH larger. ITN, then, will clash with the FA pic, which is a spatial/design problem I don't have an answer to; but the current tinies are unacceptable.
• Popular today. Great idea.
• Right-side column for ITN and OTD. Problem is, it squashes in and becomes over-verticalised if your window-width is even a bit more than half the width of even my 27" big-ass monitor. Half the monitor width is my preference, for convenient access to multiple windows and desktop, and because anything larger starts to render paragraphs in WP articles and talk pages into thin streaks across long planes. The FP left-side title doesn't even display fully ("PIC/OF/THE/DAY", with the C and Y half cut off). At the other end of the scale, widening to the full width of my monitor makes the FA and FP texts far too wide. Many visitors will have smaller monitors than mine. What to do? I'm not sure, but this is always going to be a problem if the design is split between left and right. You might try at least making the width ratio between the FA/DYK side and the ITN/OTD side slightly less assymetrical (Nouill seems to have gone this way). And OTD entries shouldn't be indented; I like to see the year stuck on the left side of the column, but it's low priority when the columns of normal text there are just two or three words wide. I'd not indent.
• FP.' I like the black boundary and white text. The caption is squashed against the bottom of the pic.
• DYK vs FP. I strongly suggest that the FP and DYK be swapped in position.
• About WP pic. Could it be of a woman? We have a 90–10 gender problem.
• Font, face, text size. I like.

NOUILL'S:

• Same remarks as above where the features are the same.
• Width ratio. Better; starting to work for ITN and OTD. And on my 24 cm left-to-right window on high-def and fairly small text default, the huge patch of white space under the FP isn't there, so you get to the sister-project section without laboriously scrolling down.
• Pics. FA and DYK too small. OTD and ITN ridiculous (sorry!).
• FA text. Too long. They only need a taste, then the "Read more" button, which is the point of the whole box ... itchy fingers waiting for that, so don't make them read too much before they get to it. I prefer Pretzels's "Today's featured article" as a heading; "Best of Wikipedia" doesn't convey that it changes every day, and could be taken as the sole best article we've decided on, out of four million.
• FP. How did that pic get promoted? Would you consider choosing a better one for the example?

Both versions might experiment with (mild) background colour. Pretzels's colouring of the FA works well, alone. Nouill's is all a bit too white.
I hope this helps. Please bounce back and tell me your thoughts on these comments. Argue me down! Tony (talk) 09:22, 29 August 2012 (UTC)

For the images, the problem come from that we don't use the thumb interface for all the images, so we have to use the "px" parameter and not the "upright" parameter, so it can't satisfact everyone with different sizes... But some pictures are may be effectively too small.

For the text, my version is a example if the community doesn't want to change the longer of the FA text. It is may be a bigger problematic, that need debate.

What the problem with this FP ? I will try to change it. --Nouill (talk) 21:28, 2 September 2012 (UTC)

• Love it - Wikipedia finally matures into a modern site! violet/riga _^[talk] 10:06, 29 August 2012 (UTC)
• I have nothing to say except well done. This is an excellent design, by far the best in the list. — Hex (❝?!❞) 10:05, 11 September 2012 (UTC)
• I'm going to echo what I suspect will be a chorus of voices to support this design. Suffice it to say that it was immediately agreeable to the eye and that it far surpasses the current main page. I'm still having difficulties deciding whether I'm more agreeable with the original proposal or with Nouill's, however. I do have to say that the column spacing with Nouill's is preferable, at the least. --Izno (talk) 23:47, 11 September 2012 (UTC)

---

Regarding Pretzel's designs:

• The "National Geographic treatment" you gave "Picture of the Day" is gorgeous. Have you given any thought to how different photos (lighter, non-crepescular, etc.) should be treated? With a predominantly white image like {{POTD/2012-08-09}}, the caption box would appear to stand on its own, which probably isn't the intended effect.
• The Vector version indents the first line of every paragraph, whereas the original doesn't. It's a small enough indentation to look like an error. Since each blurb is set apart by whitespace and (in the case of "On This Day") by dates, I don't think there's any need to indent anything.
• The "Welcome to Wikipedia" masthead should use the crossed "Wikipedia W" instead of the default Libertine one. "Linux Libertine" says it's an OpenType variant in the font.
• As others have mentioned, the "In the News" and "On This Day" thumbnails are far too small. Rather than floating the images off to the side, how about inserting them between blurbs and allowing them to take up the entire width of the box (at least for images with a landscape aspect ratio). As with the current design, there'd only be enough room for one image per box, but it could sit above or below the associated blurb, so readers wouldn't have to rely so much on a tooltip or "(pictured)" to figure out what the image depicts.

 – Minh Nguyễn (talk, contribs) 05:43, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

The Wikipedia Redefined

This interesting link The Wikipedia Redefined by New!, a creative agency, shows their view on the design of Wikipedia. HenkvD (talk) 18:04, 8 August 2012 (UTC)

I have actually fallen in love with this proposal. I'm not sure aboutt the design of the actual Wikipedia pages themselves, but everything else (redesigning the logos and the wikipedia.com page) seems absolutely brilliant and very creative. Talk about turning Wikipedia into a confident brand.....!--Coin945 (talk) 02:56, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

That is indeed very interesting, with a lot of inspirational ideas. 2 critical comments (that other people mentioned elesewhere): Some of the fancier tricks in that design would require a LOT of entirely-new backend work as well as frontend argumentation (eg. are keyword typesizes in the cloud connections determined by category order? is it the entire thing animated and infinitely navigable, or pre-rendered and static but fast on all computers? etc etc).

Secondly, a number of people have pointed out that our current "imperfect / geeky / lofi" aesthetic is both reassuring to readers (it demonstrates that we're not "putting on a show" or "pretending" to be professional, just handing them predictable informative content), and also that it leaves them appropriately aware of our shortcomings (ie all the negative sides of "anyone can edit").

We have tons of room for improvement though, and external-input like this will definitely help in the long run. -- Quiddity (talk) 03:43, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

I'm inclined to agree with the commentary on Hacker News and by User:Jorm on Quora. This redesign is based on such an inaccurate understanding of how Wikipedia works, it's totally useless. — Pretzels ^Hii! 09:19, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

• Someone rounded them all up, at Wikipedia:Unsolicited redesigns (links at the bottom, notes on the talkpage). -- Quiddity (talk) 23:08, 5 September 2012 (UTC)

A suggestion regarding portal

This is just a small-scale proposal and not a full-page revamp. Currently, the main page uses the generic bullet style for the portals. Perhaps we could substitute those cookie-cutter bullet points with icons that describe the subject (similar to what the German language's home page). OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 01:28, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

The commons:Category:P icons.

This has been suggested a few times before (adding them to the mainpage), and we do currently use them on the Portal:Contents subpages, eg Portal:Contents/Overviews - the main objection is that the aesthetics/content of the P icons are very divisive:

• some people think they're too bland (and point to commons:Category:Nuvola icons or similar instead),
• some people think they're too cartoonish (and are horrified by the Nuvola suggestions),
• some people think they're not representational/clear enough (especially at small sizes. Many will only make sense if you've seen them enlarged previously, eg wtf is this that the German mainpage uses for "History"),

This is a core part of why the current and prior and popular designs are so minimal, because every strong design direction will be offputting to a segment of the population. The more "personality" the design has, the less prominent the informational content might be (depending on your eye-focus and personal aesthetics and and and..)

Secondly, a minor objection is that some people suggest that the icons shouldn't be "clickable" in the usual way that images are (See Wikipedia:WikiProject Usability/Clickable images for details on why it's a problem) which causes a separate argument most times the icon-topic arises. [Struck per uptodate info below]

That's all I can remember atm. HTH. -- Quiddity (talk) 23:07, 5 September 2012 (UTC)

If icons aren't supposed to be "clickable", then we have a big, existing problem on the main page. All the sister project logos for I-don't-know-how-many-years are clickable. The usability page you pointed out essentially hasn't been updated for last 4 years and we cannot determine whether this problem has been addressed through software and/or Vector skin update. We didn't hear anyone complaining about this issue (whether English or German's main page) regarding clickable logos so I think it is a non-issue. Here's some of the icons that people agreed with and established a consensus if the icons are included during main page update.

• for Portal:Arts
• for Portal:Geography
• for Portal:Mathematics

• for Portal:Science
• for Portal:Society
• for Portal:Technology

OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 05:02, 14 September 2012 (UTC)

Nah, Wikipedia:WikiProject Usability/Clickable images is an outdated page really, I'm going to ask its deletion (update: I marked it as historical instead). There was a problem with a certain template in the past, and this template was fixed in 2008. And now, MediaWiki offers a good syntax to change the link of an image, trough the |link= parameter. No problem with this anymore. Dodoïste (talk) 09:54, 14 September 2012 (UTC)

Good feedback, I've struck the second point above.

The first point, that the aesthetics of the icons is divisive, is the main one though. And a consensus at Wikipedia talk:Portal isn't going to be strong enough to predict a consensus for the Main Page redesign. (However, I am biased, being part of the "would consider commons:Category:P icons, but am horrified at commons:Category:Nuvola icons suggestions - they're too cartoonish and amateur in style, and too eyegrabbing." perspective.) —Quiddity (talk) 22:56, 14 September 2012 (UTC)

Okay, let's see what you think

I've thrown together a submission at Wikipedia:2012 main page redesign proposal/Nathan2055. It's basically a modernized version of Wikipedia:Main Page alternative (Simple Search Box). What do you guys think? I'm going to keep working on it and pretty it up a bit, for now this is simply a rough draft. --Nathan2055^{talk - contribs} 15:51, 29 August 2012 (UTC)

That's a no. I see the idea is simplicity. But the contents are only duplicates of the logo and search box. Thus it's basically a useless page. Sorry to be so blunt about it, but I prefer to be frank than hide it. Cheers, Dodoïste (talk) 16:02, 29 August 2012 (UTC)

Way too simple. --Stryn (talk) 07:33, 3 September 2012 (UTC)

Why not let real users decide preferred content and design?

Many large sites use A/B testing and/or multivariate testing to let real users show what they prefer. Several different design versions (content and layouts) can be displayed to different random samples of users, and opt-in questionnaires can be used to get feedback. If web analytics is used then it's possible to quickly find which versions/themes result in users quickly quitting, and which encourage users to explore and learn more. Different design themes can be tested in the same way. LittleBen (talk) 13:14, 3 September 2012 (UTC)

I'd support that, but especially with Wikimedia's caching setup, it's not that easy to do. However I believe it was done for the Article Feedback Tool, for example (maybe someone can confirm that). Rd232 ^talk 11:42, 8 September 2012 (UTC)

Especially given the fact it would be AB testing the main page, which I can only wonder gets hit how many times. As for the AFT, yes, and it's not the only thing which has gone through AB testing. --Izno (talk) 23:39, 11 September 2012 (UTC)

Per http://stats.grok.se/en/201209/Main%20Page ~8million/day. (Help:Contents gets ~9,000/day) —Quiddity (talk) 00:07, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

• It's not necessary to send all visitors to A/B testing, it may be feasible to send only a random sample of visitors to A/B testing. This is what many companies do for opt-in web questionnaires: rather than do this to everyone, just a few randomly-selected visitors are asked if they would agree to participate. With only 100 tests per day you can get statistically valid numbers in quite a short time. It's worth testing for at least a week, as there are day-of-the-week variations in Internet usage patterns. But with web analytics, you really need to set an anonymous cookie so that the random-selection mechanism doesn't somehow select the same person repeatedly.
• Analytics are also extremely useful for testing individual pages—you can not only measure time on page (studies have shown that the majority of visitors look at the page title and any major headings that are visible without scrolling, and take only 15-20 sec. to decide if a page is worth reading) but by setting an anonymous cookie on the first visit you can see if a visitor likes a page enough to return later.
• Analytics can quickly provide statistics to resolve issues that alienate Wikipedia users and editors alike. For example, surely no major publisher would allow complex diacritics or other foreign characters to be used in the title of books intended for sale to English-speaking customers (except perhaps for language-study books?): customers do not buy books whose titles they can't read, write, or remember. However, a few editors insist on using complex diacritics in article titles—and there have been bitter wars over this for years, causing good editors to quit Wikipedia. This (complex diacritics in article titles) surely has exactly the same negative effect as using complex diacritics in book titles, and analytics could provide statistics that show this conclusively in a very short time. LittleBen (talk) 04:34, 18 September 2012 (UTC)

Currently extant proposals

Because the list seems to have been removed, I've added a list of proposals that currently appear to be live below. Please add any more you would like to be seen here. -- The Anome (talk) 18:37, 5 September 2012 (UTC)

Err, nope, they're listed on the main projectpage, at bottom. WP:2012 main page redesign proposal#Submissions ;) -- Quiddity (talk) 23:07, 6 September 2012 (UTC)

User:Dr. Blofeld/2012 main page proposal

Anybody like this sort of thing? A mixture of Pretzels and somebody elses.♦ Dr. Blofeld 21:39, 17 September 2012 (UTC)

I like some of the content changes (The addition of the top-right 2 sections).

I'm not sure about the aesthetic changes. [Tangent: I wish this project had a clearer separation of "content vs design" development. We really need to work on them separately; content first, design after. That's the problem that made it drag out for months, and spawn dozens of entries, the last times we did this.]

Specific thoughts: The TFP isn't working at various window sizes, ie the text wraps horribly at 1024x768. The blue-headers in the right-column look unfinished [fixed by Br'er]. The commons:Category:HILL icons are decent choices, though with an older aqua feel. Perhaps reduce the whitespace at the top, a bit (either add content, or shrink the div size). HTH. —Quiddity (talk) 20:01, 18 September 2012 (UTC)

I am not a fan of the predominantly white page, but rather some very pale shades.....Casliber (talk · contribs) 20:00, 10 October 2012 (UTC)

Lucky-you; I just deleted my predominantly white proposal, ensuring that the Main Page will continue to suck. Br'er Rabbit (talk) 20:06, 10 October 2012 (UTC)

Submissions closed?

It's already october, and per Wikipedia:2012 main page redesign proposal#Timeline, Submissions will close 30 September 2012, submission is over. What next? --Stryn (talk) 08:57, 2 October 2012 (UTC)

(If anyone comes up with a 'late' submission, I assume we happily include them. We're after an improvement, not a strict deadline&winner (there's no prize beyond pride).) —Quiddity (talk) 19:24, 2 October 2012 (UTC)

Next (probably), we !vote for our favourites of the 26 submissions.

Then we try to merge the best features of the most popular designs, and try to fix any glaring problems (such as the ones that fall apart at non-widescreen window-sizes (most of them. Some can't even handle 1024x768!) or with portrait vs landscape images in TFA and POTD).

Then we discuss further tweaks that are needed (such as incorporating the 2011 RfC ideas, if the final-draft doesn't address those points)

Then we put it to a community !vote, and (probably) weep at the feedback they give us. Yay!

If we can't decide on any change, we'll probably just use Br'er Rabbit's fixed-code-design.

If we get serious (imho), then a winning entry will probably be a combination of his codebase, and some of the content suggestions made in the Blofeld and Pretzel (and remixes) designs.—Quiddity (talk) 19:53, 2 October 2012 (UTC)

Yes. I suggest to include the current main page in the vote. The goal is not to try to find a design that seems to be a consensual choice. It is to choose a design that fares better than the current main page. Dodoïste (talk) 20:05, 2 October 2012 (UTC)

mebbe I'll hold off on <del> tagging it; I'm certainly not going to refactor it to implement the current main page look. Br'er Rabbit (talk) 07:15, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

There are some colorful submissions, sure, but most of the positive feedback has been for the white&gray redesigns. The only thing I'd particularly like to see added, to your code-fix&whitening design, is the Entice readers to become editors section that some of the designs have tried out (eg Blofeld and Pretzels). —Quiddity (talk) 20:19, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

Enticing editors to become readers would be more apt. Br'er Rabbit (talk) 15:06, 10 October 2012 (UTC)

{{sofixit}} :P Like I said, those designs just "tried it out". Better things are possible, but only if they form-in & escape-from craniums. If you can think of something, then ffs tell us! —Quiddity (talk) 19:34, 10 October 2012 (UTC)

Ok, I'll tell. The truth is, Wikipedia failed years ago. Br'er Rabbit (talk) 20:10, 10 October 2012 (UTC)

The past shall remain where it belongs. We now have to find solutions. I believe we should at least inform the reader about how Wikipedia works (who edit, how, what about vandalism) so that he can use Wikipedia the best way possible. Dodoïste (talk) 09:58, 11 October 2012 (UTC)

I'm not sure who is leading this redesign proposal. Should I/we just make a new thread with ;subsections for !voting/supporting our preferred proposals? —Quiddity (talk) 20:19, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

Nobody is leading apparently, you're welcome to take the lead! :-) Let's make a vote! Dodoïste (talk) 10:00, 11 October 2012 (UTC)

We can all !vote now - I've boldly created a poll at Wikipedia talk:2012 main page redesign proposal/Straw Poll October 2012. How long should the poll stay open? Maybe 2 weeks, or to the end of October? - Evad37 (talk) 14:38, 11 October 2012 (UTC)

We should add link somewhere, or no one can find it :) --Stryn (talk) 19:11, 11 October 2012 (UTC)

I have some stuff I need to do IRL at the moment, but some suggestions of where to advertise: WP:Wikipedia Signpost, WP:Village pump, create an WP:RFC - Evad37 (talk) 01:42, 12 October 2012 (UTC)

 Done - Evad37 (talk) 09:43, 13 October 2012 (UTC)

major problem

"We" discussed this somewhen/somehere before: The biggest limitation of the classical design is still the "static" design. Although we can embedded JS, not all is possible and only with big workarounds. Should we think about having more "facebook"-ish stuff like "animated" rotating DYKs? Clicking on more for "older" DYKs like Twitter stuff? Why not having a "modified Startpage" for logged in users? There is many room for improvement and yes I know the major pros and cons about that style of a page and I was a really long time against a more dynamic way of a main page, moreover I see the need of the existing proposals which are big improvements in sense of being more stylish and "up-to-date". Although I'm watching really seldom the main page (hint: my start page is my watchlist), I'm rethinking now if we should request more dynamic ways to design the main page? mabdul 19:39, 11 October 2012 (UTC)

We as volunteers do not have the appropriate tools and resources to provide the interactive main page you are describing. For this to happen, we would have to ask the WikiMedia Foundation developers to design the main page. I believe letting pros do this job is a good idea, but this might no be consensual. Dodoïste (talk) 19:44, 11 October 2012 (UTC)

You prolly missed the proposal I made and then deleted... Of course such things are possible. What's not possible is consensus to actually change anything. Br'er Rabbit (talk) 04:10, 12 October 2012 (UTC)

Of course it bloody is possible. See 2 radical overhauls to core pages, about to go through, at Wikipedia talk:Contact us#Proposed replacement and Help talk:Contents#RfC: Redesign of Help:Contents. It just needs a decent design, that's clearly explained to prevent mindless quibbling. (Restore yur proposal, damnit). —Quiddity (talk) 04:35, 12 October 2012 (UTC)

I saw the Contact us one; no one cares about that page, so Oliver can do as he pleases (and he's free to tell me I have the survival instincts of a particularly short-sighted lemming). You have a reply on my talk ;> Br'er Rabbit (talk) 05:11, 12 October 2012 (UTC)

Video on YouTube ;) Br'er Rabbit (talk) 05:57, 12 October 2012 (UTC)

Come'on Rabbit: I wasn't in the luck to get the bit, so I am not able to see your proposal. I know that we as volunteers have not the tools and the power to get the tools, but we are able to ask politely the WMF that we get (for the main page only atm) tools to improve the page as we want it. As long nobody does this, as long we will have to use that stupid "web 2.0" design reproposals... mabdul 00:40, 14 October 2012 (UTC)

I was messing around with simplifying the page but didn't get very far. It would also be very cool if we could pick what appears on the main page when we are logged in. For example, I love the ITN section but would care less of TFL (today's featured list) was removed. --Nathan2055^{talk - contribs} 15:19, 15 October 2012 (UTC)

After the straw poll...

The main page redesign straw poll closes on October 31 at 11:59pm UTC. The question then is, what comes next? I can see two three options for the 'wining' proposal(/s):

1) Make no (or only very minimal) content changes from the existing main page

The final community vote would be clearly labelled as just a style vote, with a note that content changes will be considered later (eg mid-late 2013).

2) Have content changes from the current main page

A large discussion/RFC on content changes would be required. The final community vote would be on content and style, making it harder to achieve consensus: no consensus = no change.

3) Have two versions - with and without content changes

The final community vote would have three options: Support style changes only / Support style changes, also support content changes / Oppose.

If the style and content gets enough support, then were done for the next 5-6 years. Otherwise, we look at what content changes to make later next year.

Updated / RFC added 01:15, 30 October 2012 (UTC)

Discussion before option 3 proposed

I personally think we should go with option 1, divide the main page changes into two parts, and give ourselves a better shot at gaining consensus. - Evad37 (talk) 07:12, 21 October 2012 (UTC)

Yes, option 1 is a wise solution. :-) Dodoïste (talk) 08:16, 21 October 2012 (UTC)

+1. And I prefer a vote with several proposal of design/style.--Nouill (talk) 05:01, 24 October 2012 (UTC)

Discussion after option 3 proposed

I now feel option 3 is needed, as the straw poll demonstrates that there are quite a few people who are opposed to designs that made only minimal content changes, and this could be a better way to get their support. - Evad37 (talk) 01:15, 30 October 2012 (UTC)
Option 3 is the best choice IMO as it has to most options. - Presidentman talk · contribs Random Picture of the Day (Talkback) 01:09, 31 October 2012 (UTC)

• I'm only commenting because of a notification from the RfC bot, but I'd personally like to see few to no changes to the main page. If it ain't broke, and all that. I'll probably join those who moan over any changes and eventually get over them, but why bother? --BDD (talk) 18:50, 19 November 2012 (UTC)

Not a submission

"Light" in Firefox at 1,024 px

Coincidentally, the Vietnamese Wikipedia has also been looking into a main page redesign. I've been working on a proposal called "Light".

The main features are a CSS flexbox-based layout (with fallbacks) for compatibility with any screen size, a bigger emphasis on images to draw visitors in, and a modicum of interactivity (a click-to-expand Featured Picture module and rich tooltips on the sister project icons). The modules are: Featured Article, Featured Picture; On This Day, Did You Know, In the News; About Wikipedia, About Wikimedia. The Featured Picture and On This Day elements were inspired by Pretzels' design proposal. "Light" currently requires adding importScript("Thành viên:Mxn/main page.js"); to your common.js, but you can get a sense of what it looks like (minus the interactivity) in the screenshot to the right.

Of course it's way too late to cross-post an entry into this Wikipedia's contest, but I just thought I'd just mention my design here on the off-chance that some elements could be incorporated into the winning design somehow.

 – Minh Nguyễn (talk, contribs) 08:14, 25 October 2012 (UTC)

Looks beautiful. Why was something similar not submitted? --Izno (talk) 17:47, 25 October 2012 (UTC)

Because I took too long to come up with it. :^) – Minh Nguyễn (talk, contribs) 04:59, 26 October 2012 (UTC)

Looks fantastic - better than most of the entries by far. I would favour this version's visuals with increase emphasis on information for editors etc (per a couple of the other redesign options) hamiltonstone (talk) 03:24, 31 October 2012 (UTC)

Poll results

The straw poll closed today. The full results are on the poll page, but here is a quick summary:

Most Support Votes	Highest Support Percentage
Pretzels (26) Sven Manguard (17) Mattbr (12)	1st: Sven Manguard (85%) 2nd: Pretzels (74%) 3rd: Dr. Blofeld (71%)
Highest Net Support	Stats
Pretzels (17) Sven Manguard (14) Dr. Blofeld (6)	25 submissions total 9 with 50% support or more 9 with more than 0% and less than 50% support 7 with no supports

I think, from these poll results, we should now be focusing on the top two designs, by Pretzels and Sven Manguard - Evad37 (talk) 09:19, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

I'm so surprised that Sven Manguard and Dr. Blofeld's get this much support...lol. Besides, the "How to edit" part was poorly translated by me from Chinese Wikipedia and it may need some tweak.--Jsjsjs1111 (talk) 10:51, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

IMHO (and partly because I also submitted a design), I think that in approximately two weeks, we should hold another straw poll. The reason I say this is so that the mockup creators can improve on their design based off of the feedback they've been given from other editors. If we just take what's given right now, we'll have a good main page, but not a great main page. And we want a great main page. I hope that this just doesn't get brushed off as a attempt by someone who submitted a main page design to do better, but rather a request to help out Wikipedia. --Kangaroopowah 01:20, 2 November 2012 (UTC)

If we were to do this, I would suggest having a longer timeframe, and doing it in conjunction with my proposal above: Make two versions of each design, one with no content changes from the current main page, and one with an agreed set of content changes. This would level the field (by forcing the votes to be about design, not content), and fit in with my proposal for the final community vote. Of course, we would first have to decide what the content changes would be. - Evad37 (talk) 03:26, 2 November 2012 (UTC)

There definitely should be a longer timeframe. Regardless of when the contest ends, I think that we should put the new page (whatever it may be) into effect on January 15, 2013 as WP's birthday present ;). And personally, I think content changes should be allowed in this version, but there should be two votes per proposal... one for design and the other for content. And I think the second round of voting should start in the 3rd week of november. --Kangaroopowah 04:44, 2 November 2012 (UTC)

How about instead of another poll, we invite designers to improve their proposal, based on feedback from the poll. Those that do so would have to make 'live' versions, ready to be tested and evaluated by main page readers, per the Process section of the proposal page. The timeline could then be something like: November: improve designs / make live versions. December: testing and evaluation. January: Final RfC and vote. We could consider having an eligibility requirement, such as Either 50% support in the straw poll, or 7 explicit Support comments for the new proposal - Evad37 (talk) 08:20, 2 November 2012 (UTC)

I'm very disappointed that this is still being treated as a "contest" with firm deadlines. These are the ideas that torpedoed past main page redesign attempts (as some of us tried to warn you when this one began).

Only through extensive collaboration (not competition) and the understanding that the process will take as long as it takes (leading to a design that will be implemented if the community prefers it to the status quo) can this endeavor succeed. —David Levy 09:32, 2 November 2012 (UTC)

Okay, how about this: put development of current proposal on hold, and start drafting proposals for a large scale RfC. The proposals will cover all the current content blocks, proposed new content blocks, layout, and any other aspect. The proposals will be specific, eg

Include an "About Wikipedia" section, with text "Welcome to Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit! Wikipedia is a free, collaboratively edited, and multilingual Internet encyclopedia supported by the non-profit Wikimedia Foundation. Our goal is to benefit readers by acting as an encyclopedia, a comprehensive written compendium that contains information on all branches of knowledge. Most of Wikipedia's text and many of its images are co-licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Sharealike 3.0 Unported License (CC-BY-SA) and the GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL), and everyone is allowed to cite them under these licences."

and not general proposals like

include an "About Wikipedia" section (no details given).

For design aspects, the proposed designs here an be linked to as examples. Feedback on the current proposed designs from the straw poll can be used as the basis for proposals. The 2011 RfC may form the basis for some questions. Anyone can add a proposal or make a counter proposal at any time, with the above requirement of being specific. All proposals will stay open for a minimum number of days (ie 60 days, or whatever time period is agreed upon), after which a proposal which has clear consensus for or against it may be closed. Proposals without consensus one way or the other are to remain open. Objections to section closures can be made on the RfC's talk page.
At the end of this process, we will have detailed specifications for proposed new designs. There will only be one official design, which will comply with those specifications. The page will be edit protected - proposed modifications can be made in a subpage/s, and will be implemented by an uninvolved admin if they demonstrate consensus. It will be presented to the community for comment, and relevant adjustment can be made based on feedback. After the design is developed as much as it is going to be (as determined by consensus), it can be presented to the community as alternative design in a widely advertised proposal. Once community consensus is determined (through the normal process), we'll either have a new main page, or keep the current main page. - Evad37 (talk) 11:33, 2 November 2012 (UTC)

Now we're on the right track. The above is much closer to the process employed (after a few missteps) for the successful 2006 main page redesign.

One thing that we learned, however, is that most editors don't wish to pore over numerous options and share their opinions. (And the more they're called upon to do that, the less interested they become.) They just want to see the final proposal and decide whether they prefer it to the current main page design.

Also, evaluating individual elements in isolation tends to be problematic, as they often are dependent upon or incompatible with each other (so we can't simply compile the ones viewed most favorably and expect to end up with a cohesive design).

The best approach, I believe, is to determine which elements of the current main page design need improvement. Then we can utilize the current drafts and feedback to begin constructing a collaborative draft addressing these concerns (and incorporating whatever other improvements are deemed appropriate). —David Levy 12:34, 2 November 2012 (UTC)

We can make a list of the difference between the 2 major designs and the current main page. When the list will be finish, we can make a poll, where we determine if the difference is consensual or approval, and if it's added into final design ?

In the same time, we can create a version of the two top design with minimal non-graphic difference relative to the current main page ? --Nouill (talk) 06:41, 3 November 2012 (UTC)

Shouldn't the last line of the "About Wikipedia" text above say "... everyone is allowed to reuse them under these licences.", rather than "... allowed to cite them ..."? PamD 16:16, 4 November 2012 (UTC)

/me thinks it was an example. --Kangaroopowah 01:49, 5 November 2012 (UTC)

Yeah, I copied it straight out of one of the redesigns as an example. Content discussion should probably wait until we've figured out which direction this process is heading. - Evad37 (talk) 02:12, 5 November 2012 (UTC)

Yes that's the reason why it needs to be changed, as the "cite them" phrase was a poor translation by me from Chinese Wikipedia.--Jsjsjs1111 (talk) 06:31, 5 November 2012 (UTC)