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This is an archived version of this page, as edited by Forseti (talk | contribs) at 08:05, 8 February 2005 (→Comments). It may differ significantly from the current version.

This page contains the bulk of the text for http://www.wikipedia.org/. Changes made to this page will be displayed within one hour. The surrounding HTML is also on meta, although it is protected: www.wikipedia.org template

eo: Kiucele tiu paĝo ? Ĉu ne bona ideo ĝin pripensi multlingva (nomoj de de lingvoj aperu nacilingve kaj en elektita lingvo)?
fr: Pourquoi cette page ? Ne serait-ce pas une bonne idée d'en élaborer une version multilingue (le nom des langues apparaîtrait et dans la langue en question et dans la langue choisie par l'utilisateur) ?
en: Why this page ? Wouldn't it be a good idea to make a multilingual version of it (language names could apppear both in the language itself and in the user's preferred language)?

[[Suomi (Finnish)]] ---> [[Suomi ({{fi_lingvonomo}})]] {{fi_lingvonomo}} = laŭ UzulaLingvo / dependson user's language
en : Finnish
eo : Finna
fr : Finnois
fi : Suomi

Arno Lagrange

en: This page is experimental. Magnus Manske is developing a page that will do something more like what you suggest - highlighting the languages the user's web browser accepts by default - David Gerard 03:32, 8 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Archives

Links to history:

Mockup for different design

I've been toying with a different look -- instead of having the logo off in the corner, how about something like this (with or without the word "Wikipedia" below it)?

remove mockup with six largest languages; the current design uses ten

I think it adds much more visual impact, and the logo does an excellent job of conveying our mission without words in a specific language.

Please let me know if you think I/we should pursue this any further.... Catherine 23:39, 21 Jan 2005 (UTC)

In a week maybe two the nl:wikipedia will have its 50.000th article. I do not see how this proposal scales. GerardM 23:57, 21 Jan 2005 (UTC)
With some tweaking of sizes, I think it can scale up to ten major languages -- whatever the top ten are at any given time:
Proposed portal design with ten major languages
Proposed portal design with ten major languages
What do you think? Catherine 00:20, 22 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  • I think this looks absolutely great, for being so simple. Especially with the search box just below the logo constellation.
However, related to this, I think we should consider keeping the tier thresholds in the dark; that is, we sort the Wikipedia languages as Large, medium and upcoming wikipedias in our portal, not mentioning their size in numbers. Now of course, this could lead to endless edit wars. ✏ Sverdrup 01:02, 22 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  • I love it. I think that it's a very elegant solution. We need definitely something a bit more striking than we currently have. A couple of suggestions:
1. Use live article counts so that it isn't always out of date, and forever needing to be updated.
2. Expand the translated text to read "Welcome to Wikipedia, the Free Encylopaedia."
3. Keep the layout fixed and always show the top N languages; whatever they happen to be, and for whatever value of N we choose.
4. Remove the "Start Wikipedia in a new language" link. It's currently quite easy to find from the various language Wikipedias, so I don't think it really needs to be right there on the front page. Then there's room to translate "Complete list of languages" into N languages. Or even just "Other languages."
There appears to be little interest in my proposal, so I'm quite happy to let that go and get behind this one. GeorgeStepanek 01:06, 22 Jan 2005 (UTC)
Okay, I've done a very rough beginning for this at Www.wikipedia.org portal/Catherine -- enough to work out how to lay it out, table-wise. The graphics obviously need to be optimized and all the translations done properly (I just stuck the titles of the next four languages from WikiStats on there to make up ten -- haven't gotten translations of "free enc." or "articles" or anything else yet. Sverdrup -- I thought of using the graphics of books and bookshelves instead of numbers to indicate divisions, although we can still use numbers to divide them. What do you think of that? (These can obviously be improved by better graphic designers than I too.)
Please comment, and edit at will to improve. Thanks! Catherine 02:40, 22 Jan 2005 (UTC)
Refined the design a bit more; more feedback, please? How do I get the search form to display properly? Catherine 06:34, 22 Jan 2005 (UTC)

This design is getting good feedback here and at the en:Village Pump. Can someone please tell me how to get the search box working? Simply copying the code from the Www.wikipedia.org_template isn't working. Catherine 21:02, 22 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Most HTML codes are disabled by MediaWiki, so you probably can't get it working as is. You'll have to follow the same pattern as Www.wikipedia.org_template: create an HTML template that is directly hosted, and embed within it the editable/previewable content. To put the search box in the middle, you'll need two sub-templates: one for the top languages above, and one for the other languages below. (Sorry, but I don't know exactly how Www.wikipedia.org_template is directly hosted.) GeorgeStepanek 21:23, 22 Jan 2005 (UTC)
Ah -- that explains it, thank you. So the question is, does this design have enough interest/support to invite a developer (?) to set that up? Catherine 22:33, 22 Jan 2005 (UTC)
it doesn't need a developer, just an admin on Meta. I can try to put this live now - wish me luck. --Elian 23:34, 22 Jan 2005 (UTC)
This isn't a good idea. Only 3 or 4 people have weighed in so far on this, there has been no poll, etc. and that image will take a long time to load on slow computers.
This design is absolutely brilliant. In deference to the slow computer issue, it would be interesting to see what the weight of the image is as a JPEG of suitable quality - 174K for the present PNG is really just a bit much for practical use - David Gerard 02:00, 23 Jan 2005 (UTC)
I don't think it's ready to try live yet; the graphics can definitely be optimized (I just did a straight size reduction of Nohat's "large png" as a proof-of-concept while I figured out if other people liked the idea), and there may be some size tweaking to do (to try for ideal "above the fold" presentation). I'd like to invite more feedback and be more sure of consensus before trying to put it up live. (Where should this be publicized to get the most comment? Do we need a poll, or is consensus-building enough?) Catherine 17:46, 23 Jan 2005 (UTC)
I don't know if we need a poll or not, but I really must say that your design is excellent. It looks much better than what is there now. Also, since the image is only 12.65 KB, slow loading should not really be an issue. Josh 00:16, Jan 27, 2005 (UTC)
I mentioned it at Meta:Babel. —AlanBarrett 18:51, 23 Jan 2005 (UTC)
Like it. Very. The best proposal yet and much better than the current page --GrmWnr 19:33, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  • I like it. A lot. But what are we doing with nl:, in this layout (i.e. the design somehow prescribes that exactly six WPs are linked more prominently than the rest, and to link 5, or 7, or 8, would require quite some layout work. 130.60.142.62 10:10, 28 Jan 2005 (UTC) dab
    • We have updated the working design to use the "top 10" wikipedias, which means not only Dutch, but Italian, Portuguese and Spanish are included -- see the current look at Www.wikipedia.org portal/Catherine. Please comment on the talk page there if you like it. Thanks! Catherine 17:59, 28 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Protected

I've protected this page, until such time as everyone can work out an acceptable compromise. I suggest using a subpage. Raul654 02:31, 23 Jan 2005 (UTC)

since you've protected it, you should make sure the numbers stay up to date: we now are at en:460k, de:193k, ja:97k, fr:77k, sv:59k, pl:53k, nl:50k. 130.60.142.62 10:03, 28 Jan 2005 (UTC)

New languages

Please list requested updates here: [[:mr:|मराठी]], in the 100s section. [[:li:|Lèmburgs]], in the 100s section. (new)

Article tallies

Could someone please update the numbers on the >50,000 list.

Also, nl: is at 49732 as I type this. Just a fewwwww moooorrree ... - David Gerard 09:50, 26 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Den Fria Encyklopedin

The Swedish slogan "Den Fria Encyklopedin" is incorrect. It should be "Den fria encyklopedin" without caps. Väsk 12:33, 26 Jan 2005 (UTC)

As for sv and mr, they are done. The request for updating 50,000+ list is unclear to me, so I couldn't manage it.
Indeed, it should. I have even complained about the logo on the Swedish Wikipedia long ago, but nothing happened. Fredrik 03:23, 28 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Updates

Someone should maintain this page (i.e. the article counts) - en's up to 460,000 articles. 68.100.79.121 01:28, 28 Jan 2005 (UTC) (ugen64)

I don't think those numbers are exactly synchronized ; but as for Dutch wikipedia, it is now one of 50K+ Wikipedia. We have to change the layout of this page. --Aphaia | WQ2翻訳中 | talk 01:46, 28 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Poll on the portal's new design

Since everybody who has commented on it seems to like Catherine's version better than the current version of the portal, I propose a poll to decide whether we should switch to Catherine's version. — Marcika 21:36, 28 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Strong points of Catherine's version:

  • More attractive (or so many people think)
  • Better branding by showcasing the wikipedia logo in a central location

Weaknesses of Catherine's version:

  • Fewer languages are available without scrolling
  • Search box has not yet been tested
  • Does not display properly on Konqueror 3.1, Internet Explorer 2.0 and probably a few other old browsers

(see Comments below)

Note that additional proposed design have been added to the poll meanwhile. See here for explanation and discussion. See mockup at [1]. Forseti

Now for the poll:


Poll deadline: February 11, 2005

Switch to Catherine's layout

Proposed portal
  1. Marcika 21:36, 28 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  2. GeorgeStepanek 23:56, 28 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  3. GerardM 00:06, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  4. —Ben Brockert < 00:38, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  5. Conti 00:46, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  6. bdesham 01:50, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  7. I love the new layout. Raul654 01:52, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  8. well done --:Bdk: 05:01, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  9. —Korath (Talk) 05:33, Jan 29, 2005 (UTC)
  10. Benjamin 10:53, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  11. It's brilliant. Proteus 11:26, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  12. Norman Rogers 12:20, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  13. Violetriga 12:22, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  14. Johnleemk 13:37, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)
    David Gerard 14:05, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC) Now voting for Forseti's.
  15. Cyrius ...once properly tested in other and older browsers. Don't like the books.
  16. Cheers, and barnstars, for Catherine. w:en:user:Mirv 16:49, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  17. Ludraman - talk to me! 17:05, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  18. DarkHorizon 19:28, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  19. It looks great. Inter 20:46, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  20. Poccil 21:09, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  21. echomikeromeo 21:53, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  22. Pt 22:21, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  23. TUF-KAT 23:14, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  24. --E2m 23:51, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  25. Muriel Gottrop 00:02, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  26. Gbiten 00:04, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  27. Finally, a frontpage to rule them all!!! I reiterate my request for a new barnstar for aesthetics. And if my expertise on Blade Runner can be of any use; just give me a shout. :'D - w:en:user:RoyBoy 00:39, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  28. It's an improvement, anyway. Aranel 02:54, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  29. Very nice! Arwel 03:19, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  30. Good Floflei6 04:59, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  31. I'm lovin' it ..... woops wrong place Waerth 04:51, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  32. --202.63.190.135 05:40, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  33. --Daniel Mayer 07:13, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC) (very, very nice!)
  34. en:User:MikeX 07:44, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  35. Matthewmayer 08:02, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC) do we have to wait till feb 11?
  36. MichaelDiederich 11:31, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC) looks good, even when in konquerer the text is a little bit to close on the image
  37. --Inetd 14:24, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  38. Magnus Manske 17:38, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  39. Definitely use the new layout, and don't be consumed with Konqueror and the old browsers. If Konqueror rendering can't keep up with standards-based Gecko or even IE6, then that's Konqueror's problem. Stevietheman 19:01, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  40. It's beooootiful! 64.10.150.98 22:36, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  41. Definitely use it. Josh 05:14, Jan 31, 2005 (UTC)
  42. Great work. Please make it compatible with Konqueror. Arunram 06:32, 31 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  43. Definitive improvement Skysmith
  44. Absolutely. Dovi 11:20, 31 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  45. Frieda 14:12, 31 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  46. Svante
  47. eagleone
  48. Emiliano Marin 15:56, 31 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  49. Beautiful! Mark Dominus
  50. Could do without the books, but still great. --GrmWnr 20:32, 31 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  51. looks great -- Wombat 01:35, 1 Feb 2005 (UTC)
  52. Very nice, although it would be nice to see a workaround for Konqueror 3.1. 222.152.191.252 05:41, 1 Feb 2005 (UTC)
    • Why don't you people who claim that there's some sort of unspecified problem please explain what the problem is? The one person who answered the question about "does it work now?" at Talk:Www.wikipedia.org portal/Catherine seemed to think that it was OK now. —AlanBarrett 07:54, 1 Feb 2005 (UTC)
  53. Archenzo
  54. Clean and attractive.66.61.22.115 00:04, 2 Feb 2005 (UTC)
  55. It looks great, but I would prefer to have some background or border as in the current design. Randrewlove 02:20, 2 Feb 2005 (UTC)
  56. Ronline 04:43, 2 Feb 2005 (UTC)
  57. 203.24.160.43 05:33, 2 Feb 2005 (UTC)
  58. BesigedB 21:07, 2 Feb 2005 (UTC)
  59. Wikityke 23:53, 2 Feb 2005 (UTC) It may not be perfect, but it's MUCH better than the current page.
  60. Very VERY nice work. The only thing I don't like are the bookshelf graphics, but everything else is great -- Chris 73 00:24, 3 Feb 2005 (UTC)
  61. This design puts wikipedia in a league with Google in terms of having a trademark unique design as part of its appeal. This is very important as open source projects begin to recognize the importance of branding to establish credibility for themselves - Stewart Mader 03:20, 4 Feb 2005 (UTC)
  62. TOR 16:49, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC)
  63. w:nl:Gebruiker:Danielm
  64. Three thumbs up--Sketchee 18:35, 6 Feb 2005 (UTC)
  65. Very good! But I don't like the books. Alfio 19:19, 6 Feb 2005 (UTC)
  66. Very nice! 134.210.94.20 21:54, 7 Feb 2005 (UTC)


Switch to Forseti's layout (added 2005.02.05)

Proposed portal
  1. Oven Fresh 00:54, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC)
  2. Angela 00:54, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC)
  3. sannse 01:00, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC) (maybe combined with aspects of Catherine's version - the central globe for example)
  4. Moolsan 17:24, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC)
  5. Eloquence 20:45, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC)
  6. D.evil 07:36, 6 Feb 2005 (UTC)
  7. Anthere 19:25, 6 Feb 2005 (UTC) (actually, I would love to see some combinations of Forseti and Catherine layouts. There are things I like in both).
  8. Jeff8765 19:56, 6 Feb 2005 (UTC)
  9. ✏ Sverdrup 21:06, 6 Feb 2005 (UTC)
  10. David Gerard 21:08, 6 Feb 2005 (UTC) How does the page degrade on old browsers? (old Netscape, old IE, old Konqueror)
  11. RoseParks 02:50, 7 Feb 2005 (UTC)
  12. Millsdavid 05:19, 7 Feb 2005 (UTC)
  13. JeLuF 08:10, 7 Feb 2005 (UTC)
  14. Fredrik 16:43, 7 Feb 2005 (UTC)
  15. Aphaia | WQ2翻訳中 | talk 17:22, 7 Feb 2005 (UTC)
  16. –Andre (talk) 21:38, 7 Feb 2005 (UTC) A combination would be rather nice - I like Forseti's header, background, puzzle pieces, and dividing lines, but I like Catherine's central globe.
  17. Kaldari 02:10, 8 Feb 2005 (UTC). Or perhaps a combined version.
  18. gcbirzantalk 04:52, 8 Feb 2005 (UTC)
  19. Minh Nguyễn (talk, blog) 04:59, 8 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Comments

Why is there English text on background? --213.243.85.27 07:23, 8 Feb 2005 (UTC)

The text is so that WP logo doesn't stick out of whitish background. The content itself is unimportant, it's faded at borders anyway. I chose first paragraph of en:Wikipedia so that it would be an added value to people that can read English. If they cannot they have just an adornment. No other ideology behind it. -- Forseti Talk E-mail 08:05, 8 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Keep non-graphic layout

Current portal
  1. 221.25.208.156 01:45, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC) Looks terrible with font upsized on Firefox.
    Only if the size is increased to a ridiculous size, and the important thing is that the text is still readable. en:User:MikeX 07:50, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  2. The new format looks elegant, but it doesn't appear very scalable. What happens when 10 new languages get added? Is the image expanded to fit all the languages? Is a second ring added? — 130.76.32.16 19:57, 4 Feb 2005 (UTC)
    The intention is to always highlight just the top ten languages, so the design would remain optimal. That's the main difference between this design and competing designs which promote languages when they meet some crtiteria. GeorgeStepanek 01:48, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC)


Comments

  • Nine out of ten visitors will still be able to see their preferred language without scrolling. Also, the search box will become functional when Catherine's version is installed to www.wikipedia.org_template. The difficulty lies in creating a second free-HTML page as a test page. So far we have been unable to attract the interest of a developer to achieve this. (But given how insanely hard they have been working recently on the site's performance, this is more than understandable). GeorgeStepanek 23:56, 28 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  • Instead of pointing to these language-centric "More languages" pages, why not link to Wikipedia, since it uses the native name for each language. We can make it a big, (IMHO) understandable, link like this:
...
We definitely need to clean up that page anyways, but it seems that's the most appropriate place to link to once improved. – Minh Nguy�...n (talk, blog) 23:29, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)
I like this idea. Be bold. Make the change and show us exactly what you mean. GeorgeStepanek 23:50, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)
Well, we'd need to drastically improve Wikipedia first before linking to it on Www.wikipedia.org portal, since that change will appear on the portal within an hour. – Minh Nguy�...n (talk, blog) 20:48, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Please do not rush this!!!!!

This is a screenshot of the proposal on Konqueror 3.1. As you see it suck big time regarding layout. For safety I vote against it. Please fix it to be anybrowser compatible... Sorry for the large picture, I want to limit my number of user accounts on the various projects a bit. Feel free to upload it and use the resizing syntax. w:nl:Gebruiker:Danielm

Konqueror 3.1 screenshot
Eek! We'll have a look at this ASAP.... Catherine 09:58, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)
It works excellent now. I've changed my vote in favour of your proposal.

Important question: New design on old browsers

Has the new design been tested to degrade properly in ancient browsers? I know they're a vanishingly small proportion of popular browser usage surveys, but those are overwhelmingly US-centric. Picture Wikipedia on old computers, which would run old browsers. It needs to work for the poor as well - David Gerard 14:09, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)

  • I tried it out on my collection of old browsers. Well, it looks pretty sucky on Netscape 4.04 for the Mac, but then so does the existing version and both the meta and en Main Pages. (Don't even ask about MacWeb.) On Internet Explorer 2.0 it looks almost OK, but the middle six languages are collapsed into the centre line. (Both meta and en look reasonably OK on IE2). Interestingly, it looked just fine on Safari 1.03, even though that uses the same KHTML rendering engine as Konqueror. GeorgeStepanek 16:57, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  • IE2 dates all the way back to 1995, so I wouldn't worry too much about it. As long as the portal works with IE 5.0 (1999) that should be fine. GeorgeStepanek 23:50, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  • Hmm... a text-only version seems like overkill (since it'll then require an extra pageload from the users in question), but by now, users of old browsers are probably used to clicking on "Text-only" for a version that their browser can handle. – Minh Nguy�...n (talk, blog) 23:23, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)
    • Good suggestion: we do need a very simple text-only version. Even if 99% of users can see this version just fine, we need a solution for the 1% who can't. GeorgeStepanek 23:50, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)
      • The page rendered fine for me in lynx. Johnleemk 07:25, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)
    • Text-only is also valuable for blind users -- screen readers and braille readers -- and for those who are viewing the content on PDAs and mobile phones. This should definitely be incorporated. Catherine 05:03, 31 Jan 2005 (UTC)
      • Having pages that render sensibly without images is a priority for me, but my usual targets are text browsers (e.g. lynx and links) and graphical browsers that have images turned off; I don't use screen readers, and sometimes do things that are bad for them, such as putting alt="#####" on the bookshelf images, but I've fixed that now. The biggest problem at present is the very bad alt text in Template:WikipediaSister. Please see my question on Template talk:WikipediaSister. If we can fix that, then rendering in a text browser or a screen reader will be fine. I don't see the need to have a separate text-only page. —AlanBarrett 07:02, 31 Jan 2005 (UTC)
      • Remember, though, that the current CSS specification recommends that you don't create multiple versions of the same page, but rather use the media="" tag to specify what media the page will be viewed in, and each media can call up a different style sheet. That's already used on the Wikimedia projects for the print style sheets. For screen readers and for handheld devices, if the site is constructed properly and XHTML is separated from CSS, then the screen readers will simply ignore the presentation and focus on the markup. There is also a media type called "handheld" for PDA users. Concerning old browsers, I don't think we need to support IE 2 if it's viewed properly on Lynx. The Konqueror series might be important, but we have to look at how many users actually use this browser. Ronline 04:52, 2 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Alternative suggestion

Although it isn't exactly functional, I would like to put forth Www.wikipedia.org_portal/Node. I have removed the books, made the globe image significantly smaller, removed the search box (but it would still appear on the side if people want), and deleted the "complete list" links to non-top-10 languages (Greek, Vietnamese, etc). I have also tried to reduce the reliance on CSS. --Node ue 23:05, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)

  • I don't like it as much as Catherine's version - the text and the picture overlap for both Firefox 1.0 and IE 6.0 on my computer; additionally, I quite like the more friendly feel of the "free encyclopedia" text and article count in the top ten languages... And I think a centered search box looks prettier as well. (Could do without the books, though, although it does not make a big difference for me...) — Marcika 04:35, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)
    • The issue really has nothing to do with whether or not you think it's pretty. The issue is practicality. My version can fit in a single browser window, serves as more of a transition page than does Catherine's, and will load quicker. It also reduces the amount of CSS, and I tried to make it "lite" in general.
    • While they may feel friendly, "free encyclopedia" text just takes up space, and article count takes up space and is a nightmare to update. The search box not only exists at local Wikipedias, but is located quite inconveniently in the middle of the list of languages. As a user of en:, none of this may be important to you and you may be concerned only with how pretty it is, but remember that this portal has a functional purpose, and mine serves that purpose with less space, less size, less bandwidth than does Catherine's. --Node ue 16:58, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)
      • There's been quite a bit of discussion about these issues on Talk:Www.wikipedia.org_portal/Catherine already, so I'll summarise the points that have been made:
        • The Wikipedia title helps branding, and confirms that a user has reached the correct page.
        • The "free encyclopedia" text explains Wikipedia for people who have never come across it before.
        • A search box is widely considered to be essential functionality for a front page.
        • 9 out of 10 users won't have to scroll to see their preferred language.
        • All wikipedia Main Pages require scrolling, so it's not unheard of.
        • Languages advocates tend to be very prompt at updating their article counts.
        • The page is still very lightweight, and the load time is determined largely by latency rather than bandwidth. GeorgeStepanek 18:18, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Yet another alternatives: Cologne & Monobook

File:Portal proposal Forseti.png
Proposed portal design by Forseti - Cologne
Proposed portal design by Forseti - Monobook

I created the alternative design for portal page. As you see it is quite clean and ordered. Comments welcomed. If there would be some positive ones I'll do some mockup for further testing. Forseti 04:31, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)

  • I like it - almost as much as Catherine's. I still like the organic round look of Catherine's better, but this one will be probably easier to render in different browsers... We should mention in the lists of 10,000-50,000 etc., that it is 10,000 articles (even if that may seem Anglo-centric, but at least the people know what we are talking about...). - Marcika 04:40, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  • It's nice, but again, I feel that Catherine's is just that little bit nicer. Sorry. GeorgeStepanek 09:45, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)

OK, so I suppose I should say why I don't like Catherine's version so much. First, It is centered so visually it looks somewhat unstable and unbalanced with wings of other wikipedias spreading out. Second, the title is nearly invisible because logo draws all the attention in upper part. The title is just some text pushed between page's upper limit and logo and is overlooked. Similarly, searbox under logo isn't too visible.

The best part is of course logo surrounded by 1st magnitude Wikipedias but I'm afraid that the mainterance of switching number of 1st grades' would be hard. Consider what if (as currently) there would be odd number of 1st grades? What if at some point, when another few Wikipedias will cross 50000 line and say German and Japaneese will grow as usual, there will be decision to introduce 200000 census for 1st grades? Will 3-4 1st grades around the globe would look good? Should we be taken hostage to design then?

My design was created to overcome these issues. First, I used block layout that conveys more stable outlook. Second, the title is set nearly inverse against the rest of page's text. The searchbox was promoted to crucial object on the page by taking it to header also. Lastly, The big logo was taken to the left so that it balances the 1st grades. First paragraph of Wikipedia article was added dimmed in the background so that white background wasn't so overwhelming.

As for headers (say 10000-50000) there is another way. Instead the text we can create some icons that would convey the meaning of 2nd, 3rd and stub encyclopedia. If you played Heroes of Might and Magic you may compare it to icons of abilities (like Wisdom) at different levels. Then we woudn't have to state the limits for each grade. That said I ask that somebody else do that icons as I'm no graphic artist, merely an artisan. Forseti 11:48, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)

  • I think there's been a misunderstanding here. The idea in Catherine's design is that the layout doesn't change. It will always highlight the top ten wikipedias. Wikipedias don't move up just because they pass some arbitrary milestone like 50 000 articles. This way the layout and the design can be perfected, and will remain optimal. GeorgeStepanek 17:50, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I like it, it looks very professional, and it would fit in very nicely with the Cologne Blue skin in MediaWiki. Unfortunately, we use the MonoBook skin by default, and the two don't look very similar. Since Catherine's suggestion uses a gray or white color scheme, it'd match the Wikipedias better. I assume that Wikipedia won't change default skins for a long time, because many pages (such as the Main Pages of each wiki) have been styled to fit in with the MonoBook theme.

Also, the searchbox would have to have a menu for selecting which Wikipedia to search, just like the menu in the current design. – Minh Nguy�...n (talk, blog) 20:16, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I like it. Clean and professional. Plus more flexible than the 'top ten' layout (where WPs will not have to pass 'arbitrary thresholds', but other WPs to be listed prominently). 130.60.142.62 09:42, 31 Jan 2005 (UTC)
In terms of structure, this is very nice. It's professional, looks good and is logical in structure. I especially like the search box in the top-right corner. The only issue I have with it is that it doesn't fit in with Wikimedia's branding. It does resemble the Cologne Blue skin, but the Cologne Blue skin in neither the default or the preffered skin. For that reason, I think it should be tweaked a bit to fit in with the Monobook design. Other than that, this is my favourite variant so far! Thanks for including it! Ronline 04:57, 2 Feb 2005 (UTC)
I modified it to Monobook-like scheme. This is quick hack however. If you think that search icons should be without dark border or other suggestions, let me know. Forseti 10:03, 2 Feb 2005 (UTC)
I love the monobook version. We have a choice here, and I have no problem to say that I like it even better than catherine's version. This is mainly because this layout does something with ALL of the page, making the list of languages and sister project template look very good as well. ✏ Sverdrup 11:29, 2 Feb 2005 (UTC)
I prefer this version too. Fredrik 12:17, 2 Feb 2005 (UTC)
I suspect that the table at the top will require sideways scrolling in narrow screens, which is very bad for usability. —AlanBarrett 12:41, 2 Feb 2005 (UTC)
OK, I see a positive feedback so I'll set for some mockup. I'll try to avoid tables with <DIV>s but I'm unsure if this would be portable with known issues on CSS support in older browsers and IE. In each case I'll made it so it would fit on 786px width. Forseti 13:15, 2 Feb 2005 (UTC)
OK, I've done the mockup. Take a look at [2] and send me comments. The page scales very well between 640x480 and higher - probably even over 2000 width. Also looks acceptable in text browsers (tested on Links and Lynx).
  • These versions are great - I'd support one of them. Violetriga 00:16, 3 Feb 2005 (UTC)
  • Comment: I like the graphics and wish that some of them could be merged into Catherine's design. However, I don't like the way the design has to change as more and more languages move past the 50,000 article milestone. I can see this design starting to looking awkward with 10 top languages or—worse—with 13. I would only vote for it if the design showed the top X, where X is a fixed value that best suits the page layout. I also don't like the way that the page layout changes as the width of the window changes. It begins to look very awkward with a window 600 pixels wide or less. Not everyone keeps their browser windows maximised; indeed, not every operating system allows windows to be maximised. GeorgeStepanek 02:09, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC)
Take into consideration that there are 14 2nd grade encyclopedias so if there would be 13 first-grades then I think limit for attaining that status would be raised to 1000.000 or even 200.000 and the other limits updated accordingly. I see however that you prefer not to use limits and grades system altogether instead relying at simple top-list. We ought to choose one or the other model but I think that design should be secondary to general agreement on how to treat different level wikipedias. It's by no mean will to introduce any kind of racism, simply matter of inducing will to compete with others and satisfaction to be peer to the best. My design just conforms to existing consensus on the matter.
As for you statement of "fixed value that best suits the page layout": problem is that the layout is liquid so there is no best suit. While centered first-grades will certainly look good on >1024px (or perhaps even >800px) width, it is quite wide and (hopefully) inflexible so probably won't look good when lines will got broken on low-res window.
You stated that my design has problems at <600px width. Well:
  1. I've fixed one CSS issue so that lower grades' text wont overlap.
  2. I tested it at 640px lowest. At this width there is one column of 1st grades, at about 750px they appear in 2 columns. They scale neatly up to some 2000px. I just take into consideration that nowadays the standard size of monitor is 17" so probably most-widely used resolution will be 1024*768 with 800*600 second, 640*480 as absolute minimum fallback. Now, Wikipedia gets difficult to read at about 640px width and most other portal pages have much higher demands - usually nearly 800px. So I don't think that a great number of internauts would whip themselves with windows that cannot accomodate their content. So I made sure that at 1024 the design would behave best, at 800 - OK, and at 640 - readable. Higher resolution users also would have their resolution used without neither white strips nor trimmed backgrounds. Forseti 12:01, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC)
I found an error that explains what I saw: There's an unclosed <span> in the <h1> element. Depending on how the browser does error recovery for unclosed tags, it might appear as if the entire page is inside the unclosed span, in which case the entire page gets the CSS "display:none" property. Please don't use CSS tricks that cause things to be hidden from graphical browsers when images are disabled. Even if the span hadn't been mismatched, I would have see neither the image version of the word "Wikipedia" (because I usually browse with images disabled for performance reasons), nor the text version of those words (because they have the CSS "display:none" property). —AlanBarrett 18:45, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC)
  • Please could you put this layout on a wiki page. —AlanBarrett 18:20, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC)
Nice to see such a good opinion. Thanks for pointing me to a optimization site. Now, as I couldn't expect a page to validate if hosting company prepends the page with <script> tag, I simply moved the mockup to other location. Also, I optimised the pics so that it would load faster. -- Forseti 02:04, 6 Feb 2005 (UTC)
Well done with the improvements!
  • I like the idea, except for the fact that it is not language-neutral. I hate what it looks like in my browser: The word "Wikipedia" does not appear at all because of the CSS "display:none" property, and everything is too wide so I have to scroll sideways. (I am using opera on a 1152x864 screen, with images disabled.) If you put this on a wiki page I will probably be motivated to fix the display problems. —AlanBarrett 12:19, 6 Feb 2005 (UTC)
I'm not sure what you mean by "language-neutral". There are as few describing words on a page I could afford. Namely: 'Wikipedia' (as both thing's name and logo) and 'articles' as description of different wikis' classification. In latter case I admit, there could be some icon conveying the word's meaning but as far as I'm concerned I'm unable to produce icon that would be descriptive, nice and up to style while not colliding with other elements (most importantly - puzzle icons).
What I meant was, there's too much English text: The word "articles" appears in english several times, and the "Complete list of languages" and "Start a Wikipedia in a new language" links appear only in English. —AlanBarrett 17:15, 6 Feb 2005 (UTC)
So what you propose instead? -- Forseti 18:28, 6 Feb 2005 (UTC)
As for title, I made it non-transparent, absolutely positioned PNG in <img> tag because it is more than just adornment (adornments are set as background so that they are easily disposed in text browsers).
I now see "Wikipedia logo" as alt text. I think just "Wikipedia" would be more appropriate. Also, perhaps you could make it larger or change the font? —AlanBarrett 17:15, 6 Feb 2005 (UTC)
In present setup text browsers display equivalent of: <b>Wikipedia<><br>Wikipedia logo. Making it your way would render it as two times Wikipedia. Forseti 18:28, 6 Feb 2005 (UTC)
If you think I want that, you haven't understood me. I want it to work and look reasonable in a text browser, and in a graphical browser with images disabled, and in a graphical browser with images enabled. I don't ever want it to say "Wikipedia Wikipedia logo". I suggest that you change the <h1><b>Wikipedia</b></h1><img ... alt="Wikipedia logo"> to <h1><b><img ... alt="Wikipedia"></b></h1>, and make some minor adjustments to the CSS. —AlanBarrett 20:47, 6 Feb 2005 (UTC)
As of your resolution problems I'm puzzled. On Mozilla and IE the floats bounce off viewport borders nicely. Please send me some screenshot so I can see the problem. No need to litter the Meta so please send it to forseti [at] autograf [dot] pl. I'm rather reluctant to put it on wiki as I'm unsure how it would behave when wiki's CSS is in effect so please get the whole mockup from http://oak.pl/~forseti/wikipedia.zip . -- Forseti 15:58, 6 Feb 2005 (UTC)
I am using a Windows box right now, and don't know how to make screenshots. I'll send you one tomorrow when I am using my usual NetBSD box. As for putting it on a wiki page, I think it's unlikely that people will want to go from the current editable portal page to a new uneditable portal page, so I think you'll have to wikify it if you want it to be seriously considered for installation. —AlanBarrett 17:15, 6 Feb 2005 (UTC)
How I'm supposed to do this to preserve non-standard layout (without my page getting boxed as article) and CSS? I don't want stylesheets mixing. Also, why this is needed? There is photo, working model and source code available. What else one needs to testing it under his own environment, modifying it, even providing patches and finally making the decision? -- Forseti 18:28, 6 Feb 2005 (UTC)
You can't avoid it getting boxed like an article, but you can write your own CSS (except it has to be in "style" attributes on each HTML element, not in a separate stylesheet). Catherine's design manages to live with these constraints. —AlanBarrett 20:47, 6 Feb 2005 (UTC)
I downloaded your zip file and did some experiments. Adding "width:100%;" to the CSS for the "body" and "#body" selectors fixed the sideways scrolling problem. Removing "display:none" from the CSS for the "h1" selector, and moving the image into the h1 as I suggested above, fixed the alt text problem. —AlanBarrett 22:00, 6 Feb 2005 (UTC)
The header's logo: Your way is quite good. I insisted on textual <h1> tag because of search engines. However on second thought, Wikipedia is already way high in rankings so if we'd do it your way I think no harm would be done to its positioning. So consider it done.
Wikifying: I'll fiddle with this tomorrow. Also I'll include your width patch.
Forseti 01:49, 7 Feb 2005 (UTC)
OK, I've done fixes you requested. Also, I fixed some margins so now the page looks nearly the same across Opera 7.5, Firefox 1.0 (Win/Linux) and IE 5. -- Forseti 12:43, 7 Feb 2005 (UTC)

When do we get Catherine's version?

Since it's pretty obvious that the vast majority of people prefer catherine's version, when do we get it? Raul654 14:56, 6 Feb 2005 (UTC)

It's not surprising that vast majority supports version posted 9 days ago if any alternative version was posted only 2 days ago on weekend. Please wait for a while longer. Forseti 15:07, 6 Feb 2005 (UTC)
Changing twice is no big deal if necessary. Whilst Catherine's design has not yet been proven to be more popular than yours, it has been proven to be more popular than the current. 81.6.222.229 19:49, 6 Feb 2005 (UTC)
I think it's fair to wait at least until the 11th Feb, the stated end-date of the poll. GeorgeStepanek 21:31, 6 Feb 2005 (UTC)
Seems to me to be the tail wagging the dog, but, whatever it's only three days now. 147.114.226.173 07:47, 8 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Automatic forwarding w/ cookies

I think it would be nice if users could set a cookie that would allow them to be forwarded automatically to the language of their choice when going to wikipedia.org. Is this within the realm of possibility? –Andre (talk) 21:42, 7 Feb 2005 (UTC)

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