Hi,
a few days ago, I wrote a patch for the navigation sidebar. The patch changes a few link names and fixes a bug. The current sidebar looks as follows:
Main page Recent changes Watch list Current events -------------------- Edit this page Watch this page Move this page Talk page | Subject page History What links here Watch links -------------------- Upload Bug reports Special pages
The links are perfectly OK, but I have problems with the words used and sometimes with the positioning. The modified sidebar looks like this:
Main Page Recent changes My watchlist Random page Current events -------------------- Edit this page Watch this page Move this page Discuss this page | View article Older versions What links here? Related changes -------------------- Upload file Special pages Bug reports
Explanations: - "Watch list" should be "My watchlist" to make clear that this is not a page that is the same for all users, like the other links in this section of the sidebar. Perhaps later we will also add a direct link "My contributions". - "Talk page" should be "Discuss this page" to use the same imperative style of the other links above it. Since users don't have to create "/Talk" links anymore, it's not necessary that we use the actual word "Talk" anywhere but in the URLs. - "Subject page" should be "View article" or "Back to article". "Subject page" is really ambiguous and hard to understand, I searched several times for a way back to the article because I didn't find an obvious link. - "History" should be "Older versions" or "Page history" to be more obvious. Most people are not familiar with the concept of article histories. - "What links here" needs a questionmark. - "Watch links" should be "Link history", "Related changes" or something else. "Watch links" suggests that this will add the links to my watchlist, which it doesn't do. - Upload should be "Upload file". True, a bit redundant, but more familiar this way. - Bug reports should be at the bottom as this is the least relevant.
If there are no objections, I will apply this change later today or tomorrow.
Regards,
Erik Moeller
At 03:28 PM 11/11/02 +0100, Erik Moeller wrote:
- "What links here" needs a questionmark.
I disagree with this one. The meaning is clear with the current name (I read it as an abbreviation of "This is a list of what links here"), and more importantly question marks are already heavily used to indicate a link to a nonexistent article.
The others seem fine to me.
Bryan Derksen wrote:
At 03:28 PM 11/11/02 +0100, Erik Moeller wrote:
- "What links here" needs a questionmark.
I disagree with this one. The meaning is clear with the current name (I read it as an abbreviation of "This is a list of what links here"), and more importantly question marks are already heavily used to indicate a link to a nonexistent article.
Grammatically, "What links here" can be either a question or statement. As a statement it becomes "This is what links her." with the "This is" being implicit.
That being said, would it be so difficult to use the above-mentioned nonexistent article feature at this spot to indicate an orphan article?
Eclecticology
--- Erik Moeller erik_moeller@gmx.de wrote:
The modified sidebar looks like this:
Main Page Recent changes My watchlist Random page Current events
Edit this page Watch this page Move this page Discuss this page | View article Older versions What links here? Related changes
Upload file Special pages Bug reports
I like it. Should "watchlist" be one word or two?
Axel
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On 11/11/02 9:28 AM, "Erik Moeller" erik_moeller@gmx.de wrote:
The links are perfectly OK, but I have problems with the words used and sometimes with the positioning. The modified sidebar looks like this:
Main Page Recent changes My watchlist Random page Current events
Edit this page Watch this page Move this page Discuss this page | View article Older versions What links here? Related changes
Upload file Special pages Bug reports
<snip>
If there are no objections, I will apply this change later today or tomorrow.
Good, except for the question mark. Actually, have you seen the way the pages are arranged on the Cologne Blue interface? That's probably an even better way, and maybe should be the arrangement for the standard skin.
Please wait a little longer than 24 hours for feedback. In fact, the easiest way to do this without *any* problem is to design an alternate skin, put that up, and then ask if people want it/features from it to be the default.
Erik Moeller wrote in part:
- "What links here" needs a questionmark.
"What links here" doesn't need a question mark, because it's not a question, it's a noun phrase. The link takes you to a list of "what links here" ("that which links here", but "what" reads better than "that which").
Everything else is an improvement IMO, however.
-- Toby
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