Hello mobile Wikipedians,
The Wikimedia Foundations' iOS team has released a first beta of our next
major release (v6.2) to TestFlight. This release is focused on a major
upgrade to the wikitext editing experience. Key features include:
- wikitext syntax highlighting with accessible colors based on theme
(edit in night mode!) [currently based on the English configuration, but
supporting all CodeMirror configurations in upcoming builds. the final
version will also include the option to toggle highlighting and themes off]
- improved readability with improved fonts, spacing, wrapping and line
numbers
- a mobile-first toolbar for inserting formatting, basic links and
template syntax among other basic editor needs
- undo/redo
- long press menu on selected text to apply basic editing tools (make
highlighted text bold, for example)
- after publishing an edit, get returned to the changed section in the
article, rather than the beginning
This build is a bit rougher than we'd usually consider a beta, but there's
so much great functionality in there we wanted you to try it sooner than
later. You'll notice some tool bar buttons disabled for now (including a
planned "find in page" feature), and you will run into some bugs. Please
let us know about those bugs, but mostly we want to hear about the overall
experience and what needs we missed or what might need improvement. For
long time editors who are also app users we're particularly interested in
hearing from you.
We'll be running more formal user testing in January, but we're excited to
put this initial version in your hands to play with over the holidays.
*To sign up for the beta please tap here: *
https://testflight.apple.com/join/Z0AU0KXC
Happy holiday editing,
Josh Minor
PM, Wikipedia for iOS