Hi Dan,
this is all right, and we had the same problems (and still have) in mobile web. Our workaround is, that we show the talk button (to open the talk page) only to users, that we think are "experienced" enough to handle this confusing type of content. So, only registered editors with an edit count greater than 5, or users which have the beta mode enabled, have the talk button, all others have to navigate through the search.
What do you think about doing this in the app, too? You could hide the button in the stable app, if the user isn't logged in or has not made 5 edits so far. The beta app could always show the talk page button.
Best,
Florian
On 22 July 2015 at 10:52, Dmitry Brant <dbrant@wikimedia.org> wrote:
>
> Therefore, providing access to talk pages without providing the other
> fundamentals that are central to editing (moderation tools, watchlists,
> diffs, notifications, etc) may be putting the cart before the horse, and
> may lead to confusion.
>
I think you hit the nail on the head with this comment.
Experienced Wikipedians know the value of talk pages. For many of them,
talk pages actually comprise the majority of their usage of the site. But,
the majority of their navigation to those pages are through their
watchlist, so adding a talk page link doesn't serve them; they know the
talk page is there, and how to find it if they need it.
For newer users, talk pages are their entry point into the inner workings
of the wiki, and how they get sucked in. But, there are some pretty
fundamental <https://i.imgur.com/UOqtyoM.png> formatting issues with talk
pages in the app right now. If you're going to make it read only, how are
you going to explain to users why other users are leaving comments, but
they can't edit it? Suddenly, there are a lot of questions that will take a
lot of team bandwidth, designs, and discussions to answer. Can you commit
to answering all of these questions given the other work you have in the
pipeline?
For the reasons above, I was opposed (and still am) to adding links to talk
pages in the app. For experienced editors, they know where to find them and
don't need a button to get there. For readers (the primary user type that
the app supports), the talk page experience in the app is not good enough
to expose the users to it, and we never had the capacity to get the
experience to a place where it was good enough for them without
considerable work to build out the entire pipeline.
Dan
--
Dan Garry
Lead Product Manager, Discovery
Wikimedia Foundation
