tarquin wrote:
I'm open to suggestions. But we really need to rethink our design. I know that all of us here on this list are used to the current page layout, so we see right through its problems. But think like a luser for a moment: there is nothing that guides the eye. The are straggly blocks of links that come at you from all sides. I showed the site to the library staff and their eyes just glazed over with that "too much scary text" look people get. We are talking about people who panic at the sight of a Microsoft Word dialog box here. This is (sadly) the average net user.
Remember who we've said before that we need to attract editors from other backgrounds, such as literature, history, art -- people who are probably not tech-wise? This is a hurdle we need to lower.
This just seen on the village pump:
I get the impression that the input to the encyclopedia is rather
unbalanced: lots on computer stuff (surprise!), science, pop music, sci-fi/fantasy, bits of geog/hist. The impression is that the typical user is a young male with computer qualifications and stereotypically geeky interests (jimfbleak http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Jimfbleak)
I figure I'm getting little response because the developers are swamped with database and optimization problems. I have the capabilities to work on our stylesheets and layout myself. But I can't get access to our CVS because I can't set up SSH on Windows. Is there someone who can help me? Has anyone here successfully set up Wikipedia CVS & SSH access on windows? This is an important issue, and I am prepared to work on it.
-- tarquin