Talk:Main Page/Layout design

I felt that the discussion of the Main Page Layout has taken a life of its own, so I moved the talk here, dedicated to the Main Page design, to free up the main talk page for regular stuff.

See Talk:Main_Page/Temp for ways to improve the colour design (and overall layout). An alternative design, based on the Deutschland Wikipedia has been suggested at Main Page/Temp2. There is a a less cluttered one at Main Page/Temp3, and one with more emphasis on the "dynamic content" at Main Page/Temp4.

• Talk:Main Page/Layout design/Archive 1

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I have the feeling, we are mixing up two questions (see comments on most votes...)

Table of contents 1 Question 1: 2 Question 2: 3 Question 3: (could be interresting) 4 Poll Question

Question 1:

• Many colors current main page
• One color Main Page/Temp2
• No colors (as it was in the old days)

Question 2:

• more emphasis on the "dynamic content" at Main Page/Temp4 (do not look at the color, that is Question 1).
• leave it as it was
• Any better proposals?

Would this kind of Vote make more sense? Fantasy 13:59 6 Jul 2003 (UTC)

yes, I think it would -- Tarquin

Perhaps it's too early to be voting. Comments would be more useful than numbers. I keep wanting to vote for all of them. Angela

PS: Question 3: (could be interresting)

• I always start with the Main Page

Angela but I don't actually look at it. I log in and then go to my watchlist then recent changes.

• I always start with my watchlist (= I never use the Main Page)
• I always start with Recent Changes
• Several of the above

This third question could be helpful to see, if any of us are even using the Main Page, or if we should look for other sources of Opinion... ;-) Fantasy 18:45 6 Jul 2003 (UTC)

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People for the new design: (11)

• Delirium
• FearÉIREANN (I like the lack of clutter on Temp3 but not the colour-scheme. A combination of the current colour scheme with Temp3 contents would be interesting to see.) (Done - Main Page/Temp3 Angela)
• Poor Yorick
• Eloquence (although I prefer [1] (/w/wiki.phtml?title=Main_Page/Temp&oldid=1109018) and [2] (/w/wiki.phtml?title=Main_Page&oldid=1108872))
• User:anthere. Not gonna say I don't like this kind of design, since I helped set the initial one on the fr wiki. I like it better than the old one. Love the colors. However, 1) I support different designs and different organisations-schemes among wikipedias, 2) a table-type design makes it harder to edit 3) there is imho too much information on this page. What about working on point 3 ?
• Tannin (But see comment below)
• user:zanimum
• Angela I prefer it with color than without.
• Arwel I prefer colour too.
• Tim Starling
• Kosebamse The colours per se are fine, but some degirliefication definitely wouldn't hurt. Whatever we do, please let's keep the introductory paragraph (it seems to be missing from Main Page/Temp4). Degirlification ? What about instoring sex neutrality on this encyclopedia ? Equality of numbers between female and male editors ? The previous design was a man-perception of what an encyclopedia should be :-) User:anthere

People against the new design: (6)

• James F.
• Oliver P.
• Camembert
• The Cunctator
• Cimon Avaro on a pogo-stick 07:55 5 Jul 2003 (UTC)
• Martin (but weakly)

People against all of the above designs: (15)

Color aside, these (nearly identical) layouts are cramped, poorly spaced, and illegible on small screens. Take a look over some old versions of the main page (http://web.archive.org/web/*/http%3A//www.wikipedia.com/) and see what we've gained and what we've lost. Then consider a cleaner layout... (4)

• Brion
• Tarquin - yup.
• Camembert - that's the crux of the thing, really
• Angela Reducing the clutter is more important that the color, but I think it should have some color, so I'm voting twice.

People in favour of Main Page/Temp2 i.e. single-color layout: (4)

• whkoh
• Coma
• Kurt Jansson
• user:zanimum

People in favour of Main Page/Temp4 give some more space to the dynamic content (7)

• Martin
• Fantasy (for the colors I prefer Main Page/Temp2)
• Eloquence (see discussion below)
• Oliver P. (see discussion below)
• James F. (see discussion below)
• Brion (cautiously optimistic; see discussion below)
• Angela I know I'm voting in more than one place but I want color, less clutter and more dynamic content.
• Kurt Jansson (with the colors of Main Page/Temp2)

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What are we voting for? Does "against the new skin" mean that you want it forgotten about forever, or merely reverted temporarily pending discussion? -- Tim Starling 01:52 5 Jul 2003 (UTC)

I don't know about anybody else, but I'm thinking of it as a straw poll, nothing more. Putting my name up there means I'm against the new layout, just as it says. Beyond that, I'd have to see how other people feel. --Camembert

I'm thinking of it as a straw poll too; just to see who loves/hates it. It seems to me that a lot of people were not properly informed about the permanant change to the Main Page. I personally like it, but I'd also like to make sure that the Wikipedia population is given a say about it.

I think it should go live now. That way people will complain soon enough if something goes wrong. Remember, this is a wiki, after all ;-). --Eloquence 15:07 2 Jul 2003 (UTC)

Yeh, a couple of days, and we got complaints. :-/ Poor Yorick

Is this a vote for or against the current revision? --Eloquence

The current revision. But I think people who don't like the current revision, wouldn't like any minor tweaks of the current revision either. Wikipedians seem to be split between the bland white camp and the groovy colour camp. Hm... if there was only a way we can have the Main Page design listed as a preference.... Poor Yorick

Agreed. Then everyone can choose the layout that he/she likes...and everyone can be happy and not be confined to the choices made by other people. whkoh 07:22 5 Jul 2003 (UTC)

What do you mean by "current revision"? It's changed frequently in the last few hours, from ugly and cramped and hard to read with lots of colors to ugly and cramped and hard to read in black and white and back again. Either way, it's ugly and cramped and hard to read. Color is a silly thing to fight over when the page is so difficult to use. :) --Brion

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I felt like faffing around aimlessly... Main Page/Temp4 is the way I'd like it - the dynamic content thang. Motivation:

• welcome/intro should be short, but at the top somewhere, and it should feature the key links for newcomers - the welcome page, and the about page
• Browse with the style from Main Page/Temp3, which is nice
• Browse links that make sense - eg list of biology topics (piped), not biology
• Teasers for featured articles - that's more enticing than a simple lis.
• Lots of space for featured articles, which are the most bookmarkable bit of the front page.
• rm stuff I don't care for, but which is probably passionately desired by someone else, scuppering the entire thing from the start.

Martin 01:23 6 Jul 2003 (UTC)

This looks very interesting! Please do continue to work on it, you have my full support. I would suggest to put just a little more info into the Wikipedia box. I also still think the colors are a bit too soft, maybe you can play around with the scheme a little. --Eloquence 01:59 6 Jul 2003 (UTC)

It took a lot to restrain my urge to run screaming from the room because of the colour scheme, but I managed to force myself to look at the page, briefly. The layout is quite nice, except that I think the bit headed "Wikipedia" - which says what the site actually is - should definitely go first. So maybe if you just swapped the sides round...? I certainly wouldn't miss the long lists of subjects and pages in the Wikipedia namespace, because I never used the Main Page to access them anyway. -- Oliver P. 03:14 6 Jul 2003 (UTC)

Agreed; the colour scheme is still too over-the top, but the structual formatiing is much better and cleaner. I like it. Perhaps if the back of the boxes was white, and the titles slightly paler? -- James F. 12:45 6 Jul 2003 (UTC)

Definitely interesting (color scheme aside, as this is irrelevant). Might be a little smoother to do once categories are implemented. --Brion

I like the look of it, but (as I said at Talk:Main Page/Temp4) I don't understand how it's going to work when the "Browse" section is expanded (as I suppose it's meant to be) - won't it then extend well below the rest of the page? --Camembert

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Poll Question I'm afraid I'm completely confused by the poll at the top of this page now. There seem to be five different categories. What does "People against both designs" mean? Is this about the old design and the current one, or Main Page/Temp and Main Page/Temp2? -- Oliver P. 03:14 6 Jul 2003 (UTC)

THEY'RE ALL DREADFUL! What difference does it make what color scheme? :) --Brion