Hi Aoineko,
let me be clear: I share your goal of improving Wikimedia's discussion
systems. I think there are a number of serious usability issues with
Wikiforum as it is right now, though:
1) The current two-table setup is very confusing. It is not intuitively
clear why some threads have preview and some do not, nor is the preview
function itself obvious from the icon. The function of the top box is
not visually distinguished from the function of the bottom box in any
way. I suggest combining the two boxes into one, and making the preview
function clearer (an eye may be a better visual representation,
additional text might also help).
2) One of the key features of forums is the ability to sort threads by
their publication date. Wikiforum uses "Oldest First", and it does not
appear to be possible to change that. The page is titled "50 latest
threads", which creates an intuitive expectation of "Newest First". I
think "Newest First" should be the default, as it is in most forums, but
it would be nice to be able to sort the table by whatever criteria
desirable. (The default sorting order could also be voted on after the
system has been in use for a while.)
3) Being able to chronologically go beyond the 50 threads displayed on
the index page ("Next 50") seems like a fairly critical feature to me.
4) The "Post a comment" ("+" in Monobook) link is missing. This is
quite
a serious issue, as it makes Thread: pages *more* cumbersome than talk
pages, which have that link. Besides easy appending, it also encourages
users to add a section title, which increases the editability of long pages.
5) There is no reason for a Thread: page to have a separate Thread talk:
page - that just adds confusion.
Design-wise, Wikiforum should be ready to handle subforums on different
topics, rather than just having one big forum on Special:Forum, but that
feature doesn't need to exist immediately.
I do agree with the idea of trialling the system on one wiki before
putting it into use on all wikis. The key question is: How will
Wikiforum affect our discussion workflow? Will threads just disappear
into nowhere, where previously people at least made a token effort to
move threads to relevant talk pages or build structured archives? Will
the Thread: namespace become a huge mess that nobody can wade through?
Category: tags could potentially prevent that, and collaborative thread
categorization is an interesting approach to handling discussions.
I'm therefore not saying Wikiforum will fail, but I do believe that we
need to collect data about its use, and that the above usability issues
should be addressed before taking it live anywhere.
Regards,
Erik