[Wikipedia-l] Be bold in improving Wikipedia's ugly layout!

Tue Jul 22 17:34:47 UTC 2003

Richard, 

Point taken, font type can be set through MSIE options. Fair enough. I
also admit the option is not so hard to find. We might even provide a
hint, e.g. a link on the preferences panel to [[non wiki options: hints
for popular browsers]].

Still this is only one aspect of the readability issue. In MSIE I can
also change text size from medium to small, but again this affects all
text for all sites. Medium works fine for me on most sites, but if I
would visit no other sites than Wp I would choose small (I don't do it
since changing this option after every url change is just too awkward).

My problem mainly centers on HEADERS. In a huge article, where h2's are
widely spaced apart I do not mind the size that much. Yet very many
articles have three, four or even five h2 headers in an article that has
scarcely more than a screen full of content.

Three h2 headers placed after each other use 141 pixels of screen height
(MSIE, medium text). Often the problem is worse because people add extra
linebreaks around headers. 141 is more than a fifth of my *effective*
view window even on 1152x864 screen (see below). If people would use h3
or h4 to cut a six lines article in three parts, that would lessen the
problem, yet they often don't and shouldn't have to. 

So my idea was make things like header size (and e.g. rendering h4
normal+italic in stead of bold) user configurable without server
overhead (javascript, cookie). It will work for most visitors. 

Another option is to make the skin creation process more wiki like. Why
can't we devise a personal stylesheet and upload this without lots of
discussion and without reworking the preferences page to allow for a
fourth choice. It will still be necessary to provide decent defaults,
but regular users can pick any skin they like (we might sort the list by
numbers of wikipedians that use it, something like Mozilla skin download
sites do, the best skins will survive and be further optimized). Then
after a while the most popular skin becomes the new default.

Appendix:
Screen height = 864 - MSIE title bar, MSIE menu bar, MSIE favourites
bar, GOOGLE bar, MSIE bar, XP taskbar (double height). I know I could
get more viewing space by forsaking some of these features, I can even
switch to full screen mode, but that is not generally known and not very
handy when surfing. I see a lot of people who do have a lot less actual
view area: (1024*768 screen or less, they forget to maximize the window
(wel those should blame themselves), have large icons hence higher
navigation bars, have the address bar placed under the links bar, loose
a quarter of the screen to a browser dside bar, etc). So I consider my
viewing space average at least.

I am not taking other browsers into account. I know some are more
flexible, yet emerging rivals for MSIE at best. 

Regards, Erik Zachte

|-----Original Message-----
|From: wikipedia-l-admin at wikipedia.org [mailto:wikipedia-l-
|admin at wikipedia.org] On Behalf Of wikipedia-l-request at wikipedia.org
|Sent: Tuesday, July 22, 2003 14:00
|To: wikipedia-l at wikipedia.org
|Subject: Wikipedia-l digest, Vol 1 #1242 - 8 msgs
|
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|
|Today's Topics:
|
|   1. Re: New stuff on test.wiki (Krzysztof P. Jasiutowicz)
|   2. NPR has run a story on Wikis and Wikipedia ; great promo link for
|Wikis and Wikipedia (Daniel Mayer)
|   3. Re: Re: New stuff on test.wiki (Erik Moeller)
|   4. Be bold in improving Wikipedia's ugly layout! (Richard Grevers)
(Erik
|Zachte)
|   5. Re: New stuff on test.wiki (Andre Engels)
|   6. Re: New stuff on test.wiki (Andre Engels)
|   7. Re: New stuff on test.wiki (Erik Moeller)
|   8. Re: Be bold in improving Wikipedia's ugly layout! (Richard
Grevers)
|(Richard Grevers)
|
|--__--__--
|
|Message: 1
|Date: Tue, 22 Jul 2003 07:02:32 +0200
|From: "Krzysztof P. Jasiutowicz" <kpj at gower.pl>
|To: wikipedia-l at wikipedia.org
|Subject: Re: [Wikipedia-l] New stuff on test.wiki
|Reply-To: wikipedia-l at wikipedia.org
|
|On 21-07-2003, Anthere wrote thusly :
|>
|> --- Erik Moeller <erik_moeller at gmx.de> wrote:
|> > Daniel-
|> > > Please change that back.
|> >
|> > I thought you'd say this. I'm personally quite sick
|> > of the obnoxious
|> > yellow, though, so I'd like to hear some other
|> > feedback before doing so.
|> > We can also experiment with other colors. Perhaps it
|> > should be a user
|> > preference (then again, perhaps we should just
|> > support user-defined
|> > stylesheets ..).
|>
|>
|> Feed back
|>
|> I like the new blue color.
|I don't like the new blue colour.
|>
|> I don't like either the strong yellow of talk pages,
|> so I would not mind it being changed. However, I think
|> it important that colors distinguish between talk page
|> and article page. A much lighter yellow would be fine.
|> Or a light green perhaps. I shall not push for pink :-)
|I've got used to this shade of yellow but I wouldn't object
|to a change for a lighter one.
|
|Regards,
|Kpjas.
|
|--__--__--
|
|Message: 2
|From: Daniel Mayer <maveric149 at yahoo.com>
|To: wikipedia-l at wikipedia.org
|Date: Mon, 21 Jul 2003 23:53:12 -0700
|Subject: [Wikipedia-l] NPR has run a story on Wikis and Wikipedia ;
great
|promo link for Wikis and Wikipedia
|Reply-To: wikipedia-l at wikipedia.org
|
|National Public Radio in the United States has run a story on how Wikis
are
|being used on the Internet and within corporations to collaboratively
|create
|documents. There is a very prominent mention of Wikipedia in this story
(in
|fact about half the segment is about Wikipedia).
|
|Please email this link to your boss and co-workers!
|
|http://discover.npr.org/rundowns/segment.jhtml?wfId=1344426
|
|-- Daniel Mayer (aka mav)
|
|--__--__--
|
|Message: 3
|Date: 22 Jul 2003 08:58:00 +0200
|From: erik_moeller at gmx.de (Erik Moeller)
|To: wikipedia-l at wikipedia.org
|Subject: Re: [Wikipedia-l] Re: New stuff on test.wiki
|Reply-To: wikipedia-l at wikipedia.org
|
|Timwi-
|
|> I have the feeling your changes are only gradually taking effect on
|> test.wikipedia.org.
|
|As I said, the software does not consider changes to the stylesheet
|relevant enough to tag its cached pages as expired, so you'll have to
log
|in to see these changes immediately (only anons get static pages).
|
|> I'm not seeing this change, so I'll look back at it tomorrow, but I
|> don't think this will convince me.
|
|Sorry, but you're simply a minority. There's only so much that can be
|reasonably done to meet your concerns. Putting annoying fat borders on
|every page is IMHO not an option.
|
|> Well, actually the previous heading appeared bolder to me than the
|> current one does. However, this is due to the particular font I've
set
|> in my browser (Verdana) and its habit of suddenly getting quite a bit
|> fatter from one point size to the next. I understand most people use
|> Times New Roman instead. However, if it doesn't upset too many
people,
|> if you could change it just slightly from 125% to 130%?
|
|OK.
|
|> Yeah, sorry. At the time I still had the yellow backgrounds. I see
the
|> new colour now, and to be honest, it's too light for me to
distinguish
|> directly from the pure white of real articles (I'm on an LCD).
|
|I think that's great -- the colors should only give a weak indication
that
|you're on a different page type, not dominate the entire layout as the
|yellow does. Wiki can be operated reasonably well without that
|information.
|
|> What about the simple grey meta uses? But then again, it'd be
|> indistinguishable from meta.
|
|I don't think every Wiki needs its own color set.
|
|Regards,
|
|Erik
|
|--__--__--
|
|Message: 4
|From: "Erik Zachte" <e.p.zachte at chello.nl>
|To: <wikipedia-l at wikipedia.org>
|Date: Tue, 22 Jul 2003 11:34:37 +0200
|Subject: [Wikipedia-l] Be bold in improving Wikipedia's ugly layout!
|(Richard Grevers)
|Reply-To: wikipedia-l at wikipedia.org
|
|> Huh? In IE, Tools, Internet options, click the "fonts" button
|> on the first panel: "The fonts you select here are displayed on
|> Web pages and documents which do not have a specified text font"
|> - it's generic as can be. And I have 13pt Trebuchet
|> selected in every browser.
|
|So instead of waiting till 96% of all users change browser brand, you
|want these poor people to find and change a default browser setting
that
|affects all web pages just for the sake of correcting Wikipedia design
|decisions.
|
|Maybe we can discard all Wikipedias except the English one, if a user
|really wants to read stuff in another language he can use Bable Fish.
My
|point: you'll have to design for the actual world, not the world as you
|would like it be.
|
|Erik Zachte.
|
|
|--__--__--
|
|Message: 5
|Date: Tue, 22 Jul 2003 12:27:06 +0200 (CEST)
|From: Andre Engels <engels at uni-koblenz.de>
|To: wikipedia-l at wikipedia.org
|Subject: Re: [Wikipedia-l] New stuff on test.wiki
|Reply-To: wikipedia-l at wikipedia.org
|
|On 21 Jul 2003, Erik Moeller wrote:
|
|> 1) The default skin has been somewhat modified. I made the borders
|> thinner, and added a box around the footer to separate it from the
|article
|> contents.
|
|I like this one.
|
|> The font size of navigational links is also somewhat smaller,
|> and the background color for non-article pages (special pages) has
been
|> changed to a light metallic blue.
|
|I do agree the yellow is not very good, but I don't like this one
either.
|
|> 2) You now get a "Post a comment" link on discussion pages. This
takes
|you
|> to an empty edit screen with a subject line. The subject line is used
as
|> an edit summary and is added as a ==headline== on top of the edit.
The
|> edit is appended to the current page.
|
|Not sure whether I like this one.
|
|> 3) There's now a cool way to edit sections: Instead of having ugly
[edit]
|> links next to each one, you can enable a user preference whereby you
can
|> edit sections by right-clicking on them. This only works in Mozilla
and
|IE
|> to my knowledge.
|
|Worked with Netscape 6 under Unix/Xwindows as well, but strangely not
the
|first time I tried (I got a database error). Bug could not be
replicated.
|
|> 4) The Table of Contents can now be suppressed by adding the text
|> "__NOTOC__" anywhere on a page. Note also that Brion and I wrote a
|> JavaScript that allows you to dynamically show/hide the TOC on the
page.
|> The TOC itself has been slightly changed, with smaller font and a
|centered
|> headline.
|>
|> Please report any bugs or objections, otherwise the current version
of
|the
|> code on test.wiki will replace the live version running all wikis
soon.
|
|Those lines below the section headers are really ugly. Please get rid
of
|them
|before you even think of putting these on the sites.
|
|I do agree with previous posters that the smaller article title is not
|an improvement.
|
|
|Andre Engels
|
|
|--__--__--
|
|Message: 6
|Date: Tue, 22 Jul 2003 12:34:44 +0200 (CEST)
|From: Andre Engels <engels at uni-koblenz.de>
|To: wikipedia-l at wikipedia.org
|Subject: Re: [Wikipedia-l] New stuff on test.wiki
|Reply-To: wikipedia-l at wikipedia.org
|
|On 22 Jul 2003, Erik Moeller wrote:
|
|> > 2. The size of the article titles was fine as it was,
|>
|> Several people complained about it, and I agree with them. Headlines
are
|> not supposed to dominate the entire page, they are supposed to give
the
|> viewer a quick overview of the different sections. The important
thing is
|> not to use the same font size/style for totally different things.
|
|The title is not supposed to give a quick overview of a the different
|sections, it is supposed to give a quick overview of the whole page.
|
|> > 3. There seem to be faint horizontal rules below the headings.
|>
|> Wikipedia allows users to insert other types of large font text into
|pages
|> besides headings, such as <font..> formatted text, CSS formatted text
|etc.
|> These lines help to distinguish between the two, which is important
for
|> seeing why certain lines don't show up in the TOC, for knowing which
|> sections can be edited with the new right click feature etc. Of all
the
|> ways to separate headlines from other large font text I've tried, I
like
|> this one the best. Feel free to make alternative suggestions.
|
|Options:
|1. Don't bother about this.
|2. Disallow the other ways of getting this, or change them so they
don't
|   get the same thing.
|3. Tell users who are bothered by this to switch on section numbering.
|
|I don't want Wikipedia to look ugly just so some option that I don't
know
|yet whether I will use it at all and certainly did not miss when it did
|not exist works better.
|
|Andre Engels
|
|
|--__--__--
|
|Message: 7
|Date: 22 Jul 2003 12:42:00 +0200
|From: erik_moeller at gmx.de (Erik Moeller)
|To: wikipedia-l at wikipedia.org
|Subject: Re: [Wikipedia-l] New stuff on test.wiki
|Reply-To: wikipedia-l at wikipedia.org
|
|Andre-
|> I don't want Wikipedia to look ugly
|
|I disagree that it's ugly.
|
|Regards,
|
|Erik
|
|--__--__--
|
|Message: 8
|Date: Tue, 22 Jul 2003 23:33:50 +1200
|To: wikipedia-l at wikipedia.org
|Subject: Re: [Wikipedia-l] Be bold in improving Wikipedia's ugly
layout!
|(Richard Grevers)
|From: Richard Grevers <lists at dramatic.co.nz>
|Organization: Dramatic Design
|Reply-To: wikipedia-l at wikipedia.org
|
|On Tue, 22 Jul 2003 11:34:37 +0200, Erik Zachte <e.p.zachte at chello.nl>
gave
|utterance to the following:
|
|>> Huh? In IE, Tools, Internet options, click the "fonts" button
|>> on the first panel: "The fonts you select here are displayed on
|>> Web pages and documents which do not have a specified text font"
|>> - it's generic as can be. And I have 13pt Trebuchet
|>> selected in every browser.
|>
|> So instead of waiting till 96% of all users change browser brand, you
|> want these poor people to find and change a default browser setting
that
|> affects all web pages just for the sake of correcting Wikipedia
design
|> decisions.
|
|You are so totally not getting this. The default browser setting will
not
|affect "every web page" - it will only affect web pages which do not
|specify fonts and sizes, i.e. pages designed with accessibility as a
|priority. The best design decision is to make no design decision
regarding
|font family and size - virtually every significant design website and
forum
|pushes this line. For every user there is an optimal text presentation
that
|they find easy to read, and only the user knows what that is - the
designer
|can't guess it. And there is no question of this being an adjustment
"for
|wikipedia only" - why should the user's optimal font for reading
wikipedia
|be any different from their optimal font for reading anything else on
the
|web?
|
|And as for this 96% IE figure, that's higher than any stat I've seen,
even
|for Win/Mac only.
|Most stats seem to have IE6 at around 45%, IE5.5 28% and IE5 14%, and
it
|actually appears that IE's market share has topped out and is slowly
|starting to erode.
|>
|> Maybe we can discard all Wikipedias except the English one, if a user
|> really wants to read stuff in another language he can use Bable Fish.
My
|> point: you'll have to design for the actual world, not the world as
you
|> would like it be.
|>
|> Erik Zachte.
|>
|You were the one who posted "What about giving the reader more control
over
|things like font type and size?"
|I simply pointed out that the mechanism for this already exists and is
|supported by every visual browser since Mosaic. And it's exactly what
|Wikipedia's default skin does, whereas Cologne Blue inflicts an (In my
|opinion, which is pretty well supported among typographers) inferior
font
|at too small a size.
|
|--
|Richard Grevers
|
|
|
|
|
|
|--__--__--
|
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