Talk:Opinion Left Navigation

Tools section

I find that the tools are more "accessible" when they are somewhat differentiated from each other. As such, My take is to say that having a "tools" section on its own is probably the best way to go about it. My second choice would be the alternate version on the "integrated version" (ie, if I see it right, with a little space between printing tools and other tools, the space could definitely be bigger). One thing is sure, even for the experienced user I am, the first solution of "integrated" seems definitely too crowded to make anything of it, I don't even find the "tools" I'm used to and expecting there.

As which of both is best, it's probably best decided depending on what the people feel works best. Do they want to have all the tools in one section (it kind of makes sense to me), or do they want to see tools separated depending on their finality? I guess people who've worked with beta testers are better place to say what people mainly expect. :) Delphine 15:24, 19 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I'd also go with a separate "print/export" section. Printing WP pages is a frequent (reuse) use case of visitors to Wikipedia; after all this is why we started our service. Maybe Erik Zachte can back this with some statistics. We got a lot of feedback indicating, that visitors do not really look at the sidebar as it is recognized as cluttered with hard to understand terms. I think the same would apply if the printable version link was appended at the end of the toolbox (which mainly links features that are not commonly known from other websites). Further the "create a book" link is not self explanatory if not within the context of print/export. It might get confused with a way of editing. --He!ko 09:13, 25 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Wasting Time

I don't know how much time I waste because there aren't separate tabs for:

Edit this page (article)
Edit this page (discussion)
History (article)
History (discussion)

I have a really slow connection, and this drives people away. And this applies for templates. There should be 6 short cuts, not just those 3 view, edit, discussion letters.

You can't make a new section tab for articles, cause which headline would you use?

In view source pages, the new section tab doesn't even have to appear, since it would be impossible to add ANYTHING anyway.

I can't understand why there are a "million" blue links on the left, and 6 simple tabs can't be put into the web pages.174.3.98.236 23:52, 8 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I know that the usability team did a lot of work in the first iteration of their changes on the look/feel of the tabs at the top. The current layout has been arrived at carefully. However, I too had the same issue (wanting to display the tabs for both the article and the discussion page and talkpage at the same time). There is/was a script for that [1] although I must admit I can't find it right now... Witty lama 09:25, 9 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Scripts are only available for registered users. There is wide consensus in the community that this is what we need. The layout here is a good start.174.3.98.236 23:30, 9 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The builds are on beta. Before going live, fix this problem that wikipedia had at the very start. When I first started editing, we had no "new section" tab. Then it appeared. This change will not rock the boat.174.3.98.236 01:09, 11 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I don't understand. There have been HUGE changes to the edit page. All the functions have incorporated a ribbon format. Why haven't the tabs turned to 6, or 7? We have 6 tabs in discussion pages, but it's even more confusing then having just 7 SEPARATE tabs. Having 6 or 7 separate tabs will harmonize with the ribbon design.174.3.98.236 02:52, 11 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

We thought a lot about the tabbed navigation and I have to say, that it really is a tough one without a 100% perfect solution. Here are some of these thought, to explain our decision:

In order to visualize the difference we decided to seperate page, discussion from all actions (read, edit, add topic, history, watch..). We found out, that this is important for new users.
This way page and discussion are like two sides of a coin and they are get more attention (cause they are at a very prominent place)
Having all actions at one place gives us the possibility to be flexible (which actions are displayed when). And we can put them in a dropdown menu if the horizontal space isn t enough.
Horizontal space is another issue. If we'd have many Tabs next to each other, they couldn t be shown at once for low screenresolutions.--Juxn 09:33, 11 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

This is a bad idea. Just use a drop down menu for low screenresolutions. Having verbs on one side and nouns on the other is very confusing.174.3.98.236 16:41, 15 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Why do you paste that discussion here? This is about the left navigation.--Juxn 18:07, 15 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Left Navigation CSS

ive noticed in vector it has different css names than in monobook, are these css names going to be the norm for vector or to become the same as monobook.

Monobook: .portlet Vector: #panel

Just curious so I can start preparing my site for vector and 1.16 compatibility.

changes

I do not like the changes that have been done to wikipedia. Please go back to the old way. I liked it better. That is all I have to say!!!!!!!

search field

It was not really a good idea to move the search field away from the left navigation column to the top right corner. I am really annoyed every day, because I have to move the mouse oftener across the screen between navigation on the left and search field on the right. My eyes have to do the same. On top of that the right side of the search field moves sometimes out of screen when a search text is too long for the field and then the text is partly covered. I would be really happy the search field comes back to its old place again. The rest of functions and the design is Ok, I like it. -- 80.142.28.219 20:18, 18 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I have the same opinion. Regarding the usability, we have discussed in the study already on the position of the search field. It's just that the search box above right is regarded as best practice. But only at sites where the search function plays a supplementary role. But in Wikipedia, the searchfunction is the most important function and should receive an appropriate place and not be relegated to the other side of the screen. Just imagine Google would hide the search box in a dark corner ... Please bring back the search box on the left side.

Hiding the interlanguage links

Did anyone ask the community before deploying the change that hides interlanguage links in the "left nav" by default? --Amir E. Aharoni 09:11, 19 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I wanted to say the same thing. I think we must show the language links by default, because:

Discoverability, it drags eyes towards it much better than a simple 'Languages' header, and it a multilingual interface
The language list displays our breadth as a project. It is a big dimension of Wikipedia that might otherwise go unnoticed
Quick access -- at the very least, the site should remember if the interlang list was last left closed or open

-- Sverdrup 23:06, 29 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]