This page is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
http://www.midnightwiki.com/go/Main_Page
Doesn’t anyone think that wikipedia is a little too constitutional? I mean, there are tons of clubs, many of them having a few members, and every single one of them has a charter, restrictions, and such. I mean, it seems all a little extraneous. Besides, wikipedia is an encyclopedia, not a public forum. - EKN
I mean, seriously, do we need the Five Pillars of Wikipedia, or the Ten Commandments of Wikipedia? What next, the Seven Wonders of Wikipedia? EKN 19:59, 2 April 2006 (UTC)EKN
I think that in today's world, many intellectuals cherish the arts. Having said that, I think that Wikipedia should begin an Artist of the Month program, whereby a nominated artist's article is rectified and brought to featured article standards, and brought more towards the front pages of Wikipedia, via a link. -- Jwhites ( talk) 00:52, 4 February 2006 (UTC)
User talk:Trevor macinnis/sandbox/community portal fixup
I've just moved "Help portal" to Wikipedia:Help portal. I would suggest that we implement the changes proposed at User talk:Trevor macinnis/sandbox/community portal fixup in the following order:# Polish Wikipedia:Help portal
This will help us keep Help and Community info pages in usable condition while they are being improved. -- Beland 23:54, 22 October 2005 (UTC)
I'm sort of a newbie to Wikipedia, but I have been noticing that the Community Portal gets hammered, as I'm sura goes. Is there any way that we could get it locked, and then setup a Wikipedia:Community Portal/Development page that would allow people to still participate in making the Portal? I just think the main portal is getting changed and reverted way too much and it is too important to have to worry about it, of all the things that there are needing maintenance on Wkipedia already...
...what do you guys think? -- ymmotrojam 05:35, 9 December 2005 (UTC)
I understand other pages are not doing so great, but the portal is important to Wikipedia because it brings a lot of useful Wiki related help/support/maintenance information into one place. Regular articles shouldn't be locked, but I think this should be one of those exceptions. It seems someone has locked it already. -- ymmotrojam 14:23, 10 December 2005 (UTC)
As a developer of WP:AID and WP:COTW I notice Community Portal is dull. I have therefore inserte
The ===Other collaborations=== subsection wastes space because it ends up below the open tasks template in another table, leaving a giant gap in that blue table cell. Other than looking ugly, it's a giant waste of space, more so because there is quite a lot of space on the page already. x42bn6 Talk 08:18, 11 December 2005 (UTC)
how do i get free notes on AS/400 how do i get free e-materials on AS/400 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 202.131.103.174 ( talk • contribs)
In the About Wikipedia section, there are two 'About Wikipedia' links, one pointing to Wikipedia:about, the other to Wikipedia. -- Ze miguel 15:02, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
Actually one is a link for Wikimedia -- ymmotrojam 15:29, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
Wiktioary is revamping its dull old community portal, and the changes are taking place at here. It's taken this page's colour scheme, and maybe you guys could help out making it prettier? Cheers! -- Dangherous 15:29, 20 December 2005 (UTC)
Im happy too[[-- Teal6 14:43, 14 January 2006 (UTC)]]
Somebody swapped the " Wikipedia:Most wanted articles" link for the " Wikipedia:WikiProject Missing encyclopedic articles" in the requests section. Could you swap it back please? The most wanted articles are clearly in the nature of a request by the community, whereas the encyclopedic links are only requests by that project. I was a little irked to find that one of my favorite section had been arbitrarily displaced this morning. Thanks. :) — RJH 15:28, 21 December 2005 (UTC)
REQUEST REQUEST REQUEST REQUEST Can someone tell me how to request a page?
is there no way to get a better interface? most people have javascript its just that its all so very confusing- maybe that is supposed to put most people off?
NO indication where one is supposed to join up/post/ pages and pages....protocols... and all the jargon offputting
you need to attract people who dont necessarily have computer knowledge but subject knowledge you should make it easy for eg. my grandfather, who is an expert on aviation history to contribute to this online resource- its all so very confusing!!!!!
Is there a way of recommending a topic/article as a project, if people are looking for one? Like for schools. I feel conscientious objector could do with sucha thing.17:22, 2 January 2006 (UTC)
The latest revision of this page has taken away a number of useful links. Have they been positioned somewhere else? -- Bhadani 09:23, 14 January 2006 (UTC)
I'm a fairly new Wikipedian, so forgive me if this is stupid, but: is it me, or does the community portal page not display properly in the "colgne blue" skin? The list of other languages is shown at the top of the page, and extends all the way to the right side of the page, overlaying the quickbar (which I ave set to the right side). Maybe this is a more general problem with setting the quickbar to the right side? Any light anyone can shed would be appreciated. ~ TheDevil 16:53, 1 February 2006 (UTC)
Stroring the following for achival purposes:
There is some issue with the formmatting on the last two boxes. The allignment is off and the headers are pushed down. I played around with it but my previews didn't show any progress. Can anyone fix this please?-- HereToHelp ( talk • contribs) 22:19, 21 January 2006 (UTC)
Does anyone else think this page should be under the Portal namespace rather than the Wikipedia namespace? — Moe ε 20:58, 29 January 2006 (UTC)
Samuel Alito isn't the 96th Justice, he is the 110th I believe. Someone should change that quickly, it's a really blatant messup and it looks stupid. -- Robsomebody 02:56, 2 February 2006 (UTC)
I'm putting together a proposal to change the community section on the Main Page draft to a tightly focused group of links. The links here at Wikipedia:Community_Portal are great, but _very_ overwhelming for the first-time visitor. What would be the best 4-6 links to sum up the Wikipedia community, and the best place to start exploring? Thanks for any advice. Please add comments here, or come on over and discuss it there. Carcharoth 12:01, 5 February 2006 (UTC)
I'd like to suggest adding "Categorize" as another item under the "To do" list. There are still a lot of pages that are not yet categorized, as well as a need for much clean up of categories. Thanks! — RJH 22:35, 6 February 2006 (UTC)
in the toolbox it should be a link that permits to upload files to wikimedia commons just like wikipedia en español
Just for fun, what would be the best name we could call this page?
Please add your ideas to the following list:
-- Go for it!
Please, for the love of God, LEAVE THE COMMUNITY PORTAL ALONE. It's been changed too many times, and the current draft looks too much like the Main Page. They're meant to be different- they have different audiences. I'll be the first to admit that no design is perfect, but the one that's being suggested just makes it a lot worse.
On the current page, why do we have Goings-on boxes? The Community Portal is NOT Goings-on- those pages are for separate things. And why make the Contents box huge? I honestly don't get this- are we trying to make people scroll five screens to get to the links they want? Ral315 (talk) 18:11, 8 February 2006 (UTC)
Community Portal is supposed to be a hub of activity, but it is pretty static compared to Goings-on which covers the same major topic: collaborations. The two could be combined for great effect since Community Portal is on the navigation menu of every page, yet it usually takes a user awhile to initially find Wikipedia:Goings-on, which is the real center of community activity and information. Another compelling reason to merge them is that they are largely replicative of each other. -- Go for it! 10:21, 8 February 2006 (UTC)
What about Netipedia? -- 15:51, 8 February 2006 (UTC)
Perhaps it's the old American v. British English thing, but "Articles that gained featured status" reads oddly to me: under that title surely it ought to include ALL the articles that ever gained such status. Is it, as I suspect, "Articles that have (recently) gained featured status" that is meant? I'd settle for "Articles / Pictures/ etc. recently awarded featured status"... -- Picapica 23:15, 10 February 2006 (UTC)
The Signpost is the only coherent summary amid all the reams of confusing detail that are too much for most people. I intend to put it back in the introduction. Sumahoy 17:07, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
Could this section be nearer the top please - at first glance I thought it had gone.
Jackiespeel 17:39, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
Is there a possibility that wikipedia will implement a spell checker for searching? Or is this just a little too herculean of a task? -- SeanMcG 23:22, 18 February 2006 (UTC)
What's a "spellchecker for searching"? -- Go for it!
Its a suggest page that shows recomended pages for a given word. Kinda of like google if you search for "negbohood" -->neighborhood. This feature is incorperated for some articles in the form of disambugation pages but I think WP could do a better job. The task could be done easily for commonly misspelled topics but would become complicated for new articles and long multiword titled articles.-- mitrebox 07:57, 19 February 2006 (UTC)
For me the contents box is very thin.. after the word 'community' it wraps to the next line. the code seems to set it as 200px of width, but it doesn't look like 200px? the problem only goes away for me if i set it to 650px, which seems a little high, so you can revert it if it looks crazy. but at 200px it's very squished.. anyone have the same problem? i'm using IE, with 1024x768. Mlm42 14:56, 19 February 2006 (UTC)
Where has "Policies, conventions and guidelines" gone? it was my most used section of the community portal and now I can't find where it is anymore. -- Martyman- (talk) 22:49, 20 February 2006 (UTC)
Community Portal, Community portal, or community portal — the capitalization of this term is quite inconsistent. If it's a proper name, it should be Community Portal, as it appears in the heading and on the navigation menu; however, it probably isn't, in which case we should lowercase the term in the many places it appears. ProhibitOnions 00:38, 21 February 2006 (UTC)
Today I came across this ancient initiative at WP:MOTTO and I want to revive it. It would be a complete shame to lose a hundred brilliant taglines! So I will be implementing the old "weekly motto" idea. I want to put the template on the community portal. I think a good place would be the header (under "Welcome to the Community Portal!" or under the link to Village pump). Any objections, ideas, suggestions? Renata 03:45, 21 February 2006 (UTC)
Perhaps we should start writing sub-articles for various songs that have the lyrics to the songs, and, in the cases where the songs aren't in English, translations of the lyrics, because we do know that the English and foreign language songs don't necessarily have the same meaning(IE Du Hast, the German version is rejecting a proposal of some sort, and the English version starts out "You hate me"). Or keep the lyrics in the main article for those songs that have relatively short articles or none.. Also, remixes will be linked to the lyrics of the original... Anyone else have any comments to flesh out the idea or say whether or not it's feasable?-- Vercalos 03:49, 23 February 2006 (UTC)
One thing that disappeared in the edits of Feb. 17th by Go for it! was the Wikipedia Signpost "ad" box. While I'm obviously a bit biased as the Signpost's editor, I think that the box was important. Any reasons why it shouldn't be there? Ral315 ( talk) 07:50, 26 February 2006 (UTC)
Hey could anybody improve the buzz cut page?
81.129.239.165 20:28, 27 February 2006 (UTC)
We have done it! The English Wikipedia has reached 1 Million articles! Are we going to have a special logo for a while as a result? Roy Al Blue 23:18, 1 March 2006 (UTC)
Congratulations Wikipedia!!!!!! :-) Alensha 23:22, 1 March 2006 (UTC)
I have reviewed most of the statements made on the various talk pages at Wikipedia. I am curious as to the negative manner in which differing views are presented. I am not trying to pick a fight or anything. I am just curious. I understand everyone has their opinion and I believe that everyone has the right to be heard. Yet, do not see the need criticize and insult every view that you disagree with. There are any number of views in article in Wikipedia that I completely disagree with, but when I have an opinion I do my best to express in a way that does not insult the readers. Now not everybody is going to be completely satified with our wording. However there is a difference between expressing an opinion and wording opinions in such a way to provoke ill feelings.
Wikipedia focus is around on word: academia. Editiors freely discuss differenting views in order to make articles that are as thorough as humanly possible. Thus, when we discuss articles it is in the best interest to all that the following points be remembered:
I am sorry for preaching. I have been part of Wikipedia for only a short time, but in that time I have seen a lot of good discussions become arguments because someone used sarcastic or insulting wording. I join Wikipedia because I want to contribute to this incredible work. I believe many here joined for the same reason. Therefore let us agree not spoil Wikipedia by allowing it to become a place argument and ill feeling istead of a place of learning and intellectual discussion. Let Wikipedia be a place above the offices, lunch rooms, and bars. We have enough trouble defending Wikipedia from vandals. Let's not worry about having to defend ourselves from each other. ( Steve 21:32, 3 March 2006 (UTC))
We should have a most accessed documents page and some sort of history page for each account. A message board on hot topics NOT A DISCUSSIONS PAGE but A FULL MESSAGE BOARD
Roxanne Harman ( talk · contribs) claims that she is Willy on Wheels. Anyone want to check out her user page?
I quickly skimmed the archives, but didn't see a discussion on this... why is the community portal located in Wikipedia space rather than Portal space? This is specifically in reference to whether the same issues apply to Wikipedia:Featured content - which was recently moved from Portal:Featured content. I can think of various reasonable issues (relates primarily to Wikipedia rather than articles, integral part of internal community rather than portal for external users, et cetera), but I'm not sure if those are the basis for the community portal's location here and whether they would apply to the featured content portal. Thoughts? There is also discussion of where the featured content portal should be located at Wikipedia talk:Featured content. -- CBDunkerson 12:51, 6 March 2006 (UTC)
Open Systems Interconnection: A set of protocols designed to be an international standard method for connecting unlike computers and networks. Europe has done most of the work developing OSI and will probably use it as soon as possible.
The [edit] links simply don't work; they take you to an interior section on the page, not the subpage edit section, and even worse, they don't even take you to the right interior section on the page. Check it yourself; just mouseover the edit links, read the URLs, and you'll notice that they're not pointing correctly. -- Cyde Weys 05:54, 12 March 2006 (UTC)
It still ain't working. The edit link for "New featured pages" brings up this section:
==New featured content== {{Announcements/New featured pages}} <!--{{signpost-subscription|center}}--> <!-- --> <!-- -------------------------------START SINGLE-COLUMN SECTION------------------------ --> <!-- --> |- | valign="top" colspan=3 style="background:#F6E9F6; border: 0;" |
When of course it should actually open up the transcluded subpage for editing. -- Cyde Weys 02:35, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
No wonder I'm seeing so many edits counter to the MoS--it doesn't even seem to be linked to from here any more. 24.18.215.132 18:12, 17 March 2006 (UTC)
I thought extensive revisions on this page were supposed to be discussed -- at least that's what it says at the top of the page, but the talk page the link points to has only had one discussion since 8 February -- which does not pertain to the drastic changes made on the page in the last 24 hours. -- llywrch 03:25, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
re: top icons, transcluded from Wikipedia:Community Portal/Menu
Those icons are awfully large. Please bear in mind that many users won't like ANY icons, no matter what aesthetic style. Some of us prefer the minimal and clean look of just text, and believe that icons are superfluous especially when used purely for decoration. So if you demand the use of them (and icons anywhere else), please try to keep them non-intrusively sized. thanks. -- Quiddity 09:45, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
I reduced the intro section, which made up for the room taken up by the icon bar, and then you reverted again for the same "above the fold" argument, when that stuff wasn't even viewable the first time you did this anyways. Also, if the icon bar is taken out, the TOC needs to be put back in and the intro re-expanded, so users will know what is on the page. You reverted without looking far enough back in the history to understand the changes that were made. I've reverted again, because the page needs a table of contents, which is what the icon bar has taken the place of. But to accomodate your objection, I've reduced the size of the icons to take up less vertical space, and I reduced the menu item descriptions to 2 lines, saving a line. Of course you could have done this yourself rather than reverting, which was taking a step back rather than a step forward. Fix the problem, don't just revert (because that rarely resolves the whole issue). Fixing the icon bar was just as easy as taking a screen shot and marking it up. -- Go for it! 19:36, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
Stop putting everything inside boxes inside boxes inside boxes. Why does everything have to be enclosed inside 10 levels of boxes? This is horrible web design. What ever happened to using whitespace? Kaldari 22:50, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
Minimalize? Thanks for the feedback. Okay, I'll see what I can do... -- Go for it! 09:36, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
The community portal is a reference page, a place to go to find whatever you are looking for pertaining to the "community" theme. If it isn't here, at least there will be a link taking you there. The icon menu at the top of the page is intended to help users navigate the page more easily, and is a bit clearer than the box TOC we had before. -- Go for it! 13:08, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
The layout looks great now! Thanks to whoever got rid of all the boxes. It's much easier on the eyes now :) Kaldari 22:02, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
To clarify my main approach, it is to introduce a variety of changes, and see which ones stick. On the community portal, neither the colors nor the lines took, but quite a few improvements did:
Each of those improvements were put to immediate advantage by the community, rather than waiting on a draft page for weeks on end. Both major draft projects (Main Page, and Help) died on the vine for many weeks until someone came along and either revived the project or bypassed it altogether. I think the tendency for draft projects to wither is because they are shoved off in a corner somewhere where they are dominated by a fanatic few who tend to drive everyone else who strays in there away (reverting bold edits in favor of some preconceived though incomplete model), and creativity is used up for lack of new blood. Meanwhile there's usually a notice on the real page telling people not to edit it directly. The combination of these two factors may cause a page to stagnate, which may be exactly what happened to the help page before its direct overhaul.
Editing a page directly allows for much more immediate feedback on undesirable changes, such as the aesthetic elements feedback posted above, while retaining the good new elements users like. I think this is the essence of the wiki-model, and its greatest strength, and see no reason to hamper it nor impede it in any way. (Except of course, in the case of excessive vandalism, and then only temporarily). Just my two cents' worth. --
Go for it!
13:49, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
Categories · Glossaries · Lists · Overviews · Portals · Questions · Reference · Site news · A-Z Index
Arts | Biography | Culture | Geography | History | Mathematics | Philosophy | Science | Society | Technology
Please add to discussion on the usefulness of the browsebar/catbar headers,
That is, discussion is underway to remove links from the above bar, as well as remove the bar itself from many of its current locations. We need lots of feedback on this issue, to make sure we aren't about to remove something that gets a lot of use. So if you use the above bar, you need to let us know. Or if you just have an opinion, like how to gather appropriate feedback (!) drop on by and tell us. Do non-editors use the bar? And how do we find this out?! -- Go for it! 22:51, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
The top of the Article Improvement Drive text still shows "Great leap forward and decline of the roman empire" as the current AID articles, but iran and ego, superego, and id are the current ones shown in the excerpts. The text is protected, so I can't fix this. Can someone with access fix it? -- User:Rayc
Done. Thanks for pointing that out. -- Go for it! 23:05, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
Go for it! - Thanks for expanding the policy section. Though, I think we can't emphasize these enough; therefore, they need to be yet more prominent, such as closer to the top of the page. -- Aude ( talk | contribs) 20:46, 24 March 2006 (UTC)
I'll see what I can come up with. Let me stew on it awhile. They don't really fit under "departments" anyways. -- 24.18.171.99 20:12, 25 March 2006 (UTC)
The structure of this page requires some serious reconsideration.
It looks essentially like a number of lists crammed together into boxes, with no clear logic or structure or helpful visual cues.
It is far too large and the structure is far too diffuse (especially in the "by departments" section and below).
The use of acronyms for pages in the Wikipedia namespace clutters the page further. The use of colours makes no sense that I can understand.
There are three separate boxes about "Help".
Things to do and collaborations are in separate places, and there is more similar stuff under "editorial departments".
The template on top replicates some essential content but shows no relation to the structure of the page.
Style guides and other essential guidelines are stuffed away in to a crammed corner at the lower right.
"Editor resources" (I imagine that's what many people will look for here) is in an unrelated place near the bottom where few people will look. And so on, and so on.
Sorry to say, but this portal page looks plain unusable. I have edited Wikipedia for three years and know my ways around, but this beats me. I can not imagine a newbie-to-moderately-advanced user finding an answer to a question or otherwise gaining any profit from using it.
I think a redesign from scratch would be the best idea. And first and foremost, one should think about usability before trying to improve anything. Our current main page might give a few ideas how to uncram information and make a visually helpful structure. Kosebamse 21:51, 25 March 2006 (UTC)
Could we reduce the size of the lefthand column in "Wikipedia by Department" section? We're getting horizontal scrollbars at 800 width. And that will give the 3 columns on the right more room to breathe. Thanks. -- Quiddity 21:56, 25 March 2006 (UTC)
The opening sentance of the Main Community Portal Page has a spelling mistake. Since it is a protected page, I donot know how to correct it. I request someone to please correct it and then delete this message later. Thanks in advance, Ashwin Baindur
"A public collaboration to redesign the Community Portal is currently taking place here. Please contribute and help Wikipedia becaome a more usable place." —Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.145.128.6 ( talk • contribs)
Can we change the purple yellow criss-cross combination?...it's kind of getting annoying. Osbus 02:18, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
Someone chopped off about two thirds of the portal...I like it.-- Osbus 20:23, 29 March 2006 (UTC)
Cropping like this basicaly misunderstands the concept of the portal. This portal is to offer an 'all on one page' access to common comunity tasks. It's not a reader orientated portal, but a functional one. Don't remove functionality without discussion! I'm reverting this whole mess since it was apparently accidental, and done without discussion. -- Barberio 21:11, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
Does anyone like the yellow background?-- Osbus 21:39, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Good Article Collaboration of the week is a nice idea, but is suffering due to people's ignorance of the project. Can I suggest it should have a small box of it's own below 'Article Improvement Drive'?
Maybe something similar to this,
The Good Article Collaboration of the week works to polish already good articles so they are fit to become featured-standard articles. The subject of this week's article improvement drive is History of the Internet.
You can still help with last week's articles, H5N1, or help pick next week's articles.
This is smaller than the other two, since those have a higher rated priority. Good Article Improvement is still needed, since there's a tendancy for articles to get to a 'good' state, but never get that final push needed to bring it up to FAC. -- Barberio 13:34, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
Kmf, I like the way you categorized the posts on the CBB. -- Go for it! 22:31, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
The community bulletin board should be kept at the top (i.e., front and center), because that is the most visible and most easily accessed location for it right now. It's probably a safe assumption that those who make regular use of it will object if we move it. So it should be kept there until we can convince WP's developers to give the CBB its own slot on the navigation menu (right under "Main Page"). -- Go for it! 22:40, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
It is very likely that the Community Bulletin Board is going to continue growing. We have to face the fact that it is extremely popular. Therefore, we really need to accomodate it. I believe the best way to do this, and still minimize the time and actions required to get to the other CP material is to place each major section on its own subpage. Clicking on the menu is a lot faster than scrolling down the page. Also, there may be many users who have a favorite section, which makes the provided shortcuts particulary useful for them (shortcuts / redirects can't be pointed to sections of a page). By splitting up the Community Portal, we decrease the amount of time it takes to get to a desired section. For those who like it all on one page, we can provide a site map as was done for the help menu pages. That way, both camps are served. -- Go for it! 22:49, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
I've started to develop a Site Map for the CP, which pulls in all the sections for those who want to browse it all on one page. Wikipedia:Community Portal/Site map Though there are some formatting bugs that need to be tracked down. Probably a table delimiter or two are missing on the subpages. -- Go for it! 23:17, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
I recomend keeping the Portal as the All in One page. And making a page that is just the Community bulletin board, for those who want just that. Cropping the main portal page would mean it is no longer a portal. -- Barberio 00:04, 1 April 2006 (UTC)
When an editor reverts to say you have not gained consensus for an edit, it's an indication that the edit is so fundamental a change as to require consensus support. If discussion on the talk page has opposed the change, that indicates people don't support it. In both cases you should atempt to generate consensus support for a change.
Editing the page to conform to your own view on what it should be, without regard to consensus, is not a nice thing. Please do not continue to do so. -- Barberio 11:04, 1 April 2006 (UTC)
This page is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
http://www.midnightwiki.com/go/Main_Page
Doesn’t anyone think that wikipedia is a little too constitutional? I mean, there are tons of clubs, many of them having a few members, and every single one of them has a charter, restrictions, and such. I mean, it seems all a little extraneous. Besides, wikipedia is an encyclopedia, not a public forum. - EKN
I mean, seriously, do we need the Five Pillars of Wikipedia, or the Ten Commandments of Wikipedia? What next, the Seven Wonders of Wikipedia? EKN 19:59, 2 April 2006 (UTC)EKN
I think that in today's world, many intellectuals cherish the arts. Having said that, I think that Wikipedia should begin an Artist of the Month program, whereby a nominated artist's article is rectified and brought to featured article standards, and brought more towards the front pages of Wikipedia, via a link. -- Jwhites ( talk) 00:52, 4 February 2006 (UTC)
User talk:Trevor macinnis/sandbox/community portal fixup
I've just moved "Help portal" to Wikipedia:Help portal. I would suggest that we implement the changes proposed at User talk:Trevor macinnis/sandbox/community portal fixup in the following order:# Polish Wikipedia:Help portal
This will help us keep Help and Community info pages in usable condition while they are being improved. -- Beland 23:54, 22 October 2005 (UTC)
I'm sort of a newbie to Wikipedia, but I have been noticing that the Community Portal gets hammered, as I'm sura goes. Is there any way that we could get it locked, and then setup a Wikipedia:Community Portal/Development page that would allow people to still participate in making the Portal? I just think the main portal is getting changed and reverted way too much and it is too important to have to worry about it, of all the things that there are needing maintenance on Wkipedia already...
...what do you guys think? -- ymmotrojam 05:35, 9 December 2005 (UTC)
I understand other pages are not doing so great, but the portal is important to Wikipedia because it brings a lot of useful Wiki related help/support/maintenance information into one place. Regular articles shouldn't be locked, but I think this should be one of those exceptions. It seems someone has locked it already. -- ymmotrojam 14:23, 10 December 2005 (UTC)
As a developer of WP:AID and WP:COTW I notice Community Portal is dull. I have therefore inserte
The ===Other collaborations=== subsection wastes space because it ends up below the open tasks template in another table, leaving a giant gap in that blue table cell. Other than looking ugly, it's a giant waste of space, more so because there is quite a lot of space on the page already. x42bn6 Talk 08:18, 11 December 2005 (UTC)
how do i get free notes on AS/400 how do i get free e-materials on AS/400 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 202.131.103.174 ( talk • contribs)
In the About Wikipedia section, there are two 'About Wikipedia' links, one pointing to Wikipedia:about, the other to Wikipedia. -- Ze miguel 15:02, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
Actually one is a link for Wikimedia -- ymmotrojam 15:29, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
Wiktioary is revamping its dull old community portal, and the changes are taking place at here. It's taken this page's colour scheme, and maybe you guys could help out making it prettier? Cheers! -- Dangherous 15:29, 20 December 2005 (UTC)
Im happy too[[-- Teal6 14:43, 14 January 2006 (UTC)]]
Somebody swapped the " Wikipedia:Most wanted articles" link for the " Wikipedia:WikiProject Missing encyclopedic articles" in the requests section. Could you swap it back please? The most wanted articles are clearly in the nature of a request by the community, whereas the encyclopedic links are only requests by that project. I was a little irked to find that one of my favorite section had been arbitrarily displaced this morning. Thanks. :) — RJH 15:28, 21 December 2005 (UTC)
REQUEST REQUEST REQUEST REQUEST Can someone tell me how to request a page?
is there no way to get a better interface? most people have javascript its just that its all so very confusing- maybe that is supposed to put most people off?
NO indication where one is supposed to join up/post/ pages and pages....protocols... and all the jargon offputting
you need to attract people who dont necessarily have computer knowledge but subject knowledge you should make it easy for eg. my grandfather, who is an expert on aviation history to contribute to this online resource- its all so very confusing!!!!!
Is there a way of recommending a topic/article as a project, if people are looking for one? Like for schools. I feel conscientious objector could do with sucha thing.17:22, 2 January 2006 (UTC)
The latest revision of this page has taken away a number of useful links. Have they been positioned somewhere else? -- Bhadani 09:23, 14 January 2006 (UTC)
I'm a fairly new Wikipedian, so forgive me if this is stupid, but: is it me, or does the community portal page not display properly in the "colgne blue" skin? The list of other languages is shown at the top of the page, and extends all the way to the right side of the page, overlaying the quickbar (which I ave set to the right side). Maybe this is a more general problem with setting the quickbar to the right side? Any light anyone can shed would be appreciated. ~ TheDevil 16:53, 1 February 2006 (UTC)
Stroring the following for achival purposes:
There is some issue with the formmatting on the last two boxes. The allignment is off and the headers are pushed down. I played around with it but my previews didn't show any progress. Can anyone fix this please?-- HereToHelp ( talk • contribs) 22:19, 21 January 2006 (UTC)
Does anyone else think this page should be under the Portal namespace rather than the Wikipedia namespace? — Moe ε 20:58, 29 January 2006 (UTC)
Samuel Alito isn't the 96th Justice, he is the 110th I believe. Someone should change that quickly, it's a really blatant messup and it looks stupid. -- Robsomebody 02:56, 2 February 2006 (UTC)
I'm putting together a proposal to change the community section on the Main Page draft to a tightly focused group of links. The links here at Wikipedia:Community_Portal are great, but _very_ overwhelming for the first-time visitor. What would be the best 4-6 links to sum up the Wikipedia community, and the best place to start exploring? Thanks for any advice. Please add comments here, or come on over and discuss it there. Carcharoth 12:01, 5 February 2006 (UTC)
I'd like to suggest adding "Categorize" as another item under the "To do" list. There are still a lot of pages that are not yet categorized, as well as a need for much clean up of categories. Thanks! — RJH 22:35, 6 February 2006 (UTC)
in the toolbox it should be a link that permits to upload files to wikimedia commons just like wikipedia en español
Just for fun, what would be the best name we could call this page?
Please add your ideas to the following list:
-- Go for it!
Please, for the love of God, LEAVE THE COMMUNITY PORTAL ALONE. It's been changed too many times, and the current draft looks too much like the Main Page. They're meant to be different- they have different audiences. I'll be the first to admit that no design is perfect, but the one that's being suggested just makes it a lot worse.
On the current page, why do we have Goings-on boxes? The Community Portal is NOT Goings-on- those pages are for separate things. And why make the Contents box huge? I honestly don't get this- are we trying to make people scroll five screens to get to the links they want? Ral315 (talk) 18:11, 8 February 2006 (UTC)
Community Portal is supposed to be a hub of activity, but it is pretty static compared to Goings-on which covers the same major topic: collaborations. The two could be combined for great effect since Community Portal is on the navigation menu of every page, yet it usually takes a user awhile to initially find Wikipedia:Goings-on, which is the real center of community activity and information. Another compelling reason to merge them is that they are largely replicative of each other. -- Go for it! 10:21, 8 February 2006 (UTC)
What about Netipedia? -- 15:51, 8 February 2006 (UTC)
Perhaps it's the old American v. British English thing, but "Articles that gained featured status" reads oddly to me: under that title surely it ought to include ALL the articles that ever gained such status. Is it, as I suspect, "Articles that have (recently) gained featured status" that is meant? I'd settle for "Articles / Pictures/ etc. recently awarded featured status"... -- Picapica 23:15, 10 February 2006 (UTC)
The Signpost is the only coherent summary amid all the reams of confusing detail that are too much for most people. I intend to put it back in the introduction. Sumahoy 17:07, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
Could this section be nearer the top please - at first glance I thought it had gone.
Jackiespeel 17:39, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
Is there a possibility that wikipedia will implement a spell checker for searching? Or is this just a little too herculean of a task? -- SeanMcG 23:22, 18 February 2006 (UTC)
What's a "spellchecker for searching"? -- Go for it!
Its a suggest page that shows recomended pages for a given word. Kinda of like google if you search for "negbohood" -->neighborhood. This feature is incorperated for some articles in the form of disambugation pages but I think WP could do a better job. The task could be done easily for commonly misspelled topics but would become complicated for new articles and long multiword titled articles.-- mitrebox 07:57, 19 February 2006 (UTC)
For me the contents box is very thin.. after the word 'community' it wraps to the next line. the code seems to set it as 200px of width, but it doesn't look like 200px? the problem only goes away for me if i set it to 650px, which seems a little high, so you can revert it if it looks crazy. but at 200px it's very squished.. anyone have the same problem? i'm using IE, with 1024x768. Mlm42 14:56, 19 February 2006 (UTC)
Where has "Policies, conventions and guidelines" gone? it was my most used section of the community portal and now I can't find where it is anymore. -- Martyman- (talk) 22:49, 20 February 2006 (UTC)
Community Portal, Community portal, or community portal — the capitalization of this term is quite inconsistent. If it's a proper name, it should be Community Portal, as it appears in the heading and on the navigation menu; however, it probably isn't, in which case we should lowercase the term in the many places it appears. ProhibitOnions 00:38, 21 February 2006 (UTC)
Today I came across this ancient initiative at WP:MOTTO and I want to revive it. It would be a complete shame to lose a hundred brilliant taglines! So I will be implementing the old "weekly motto" idea. I want to put the template on the community portal. I think a good place would be the header (under "Welcome to the Community Portal!" or under the link to Village pump). Any objections, ideas, suggestions? Renata 03:45, 21 February 2006 (UTC)
Perhaps we should start writing sub-articles for various songs that have the lyrics to the songs, and, in the cases where the songs aren't in English, translations of the lyrics, because we do know that the English and foreign language songs don't necessarily have the same meaning(IE Du Hast, the German version is rejecting a proposal of some sort, and the English version starts out "You hate me"). Or keep the lyrics in the main article for those songs that have relatively short articles or none.. Also, remixes will be linked to the lyrics of the original... Anyone else have any comments to flesh out the idea or say whether or not it's feasable?-- Vercalos 03:49, 23 February 2006 (UTC)
One thing that disappeared in the edits of Feb. 17th by Go for it! was the Wikipedia Signpost "ad" box. While I'm obviously a bit biased as the Signpost's editor, I think that the box was important. Any reasons why it shouldn't be there? Ral315 ( talk) 07:50, 26 February 2006 (UTC)
Hey could anybody improve the buzz cut page?
81.129.239.165 20:28, 27 February 2006 (UTC)
We have done it! The English Wikipedia has reached 1 Million articles! Are we going to have a special logo for a while as a result? Roy Al Blue 23:18, 1 March 2006 (UTC)
Congratulations Wikipedia!!!!!! :-) Alensha 23:22, 1 March 2006 (UTC)
I have reviewed most of the statements made on the various talk pages at Wikipedia. I am curious as to the negative manner in which differing views are presented. I am not trying to pick a fight or anything. I am just curious. I understand everyone has their opinion and I believe that everyone has the right to be heard. Yet, do not see the need criticize and insult every view that you disagree with. There are any number of views in article in Wikipedia that I completely disagree with, but when I have an opinion I do my best to express in a way that does not insult the readers. Now not everybody is going to be completely satified with our wording. However there is a difference between expressing an opinion and wording opinions in such a way to provoke ill feelings.
Wikipedia focus is around on word: academia. Editiors freely discuss differenting views in order to make articles that are as thorough as humanly possible. Thus, when we discuss articles it is in the best interest to all that the following points be remembered:
I am sorry for preaching. I have been part of Wikipedia for only a short time, but in that time I have seen a lot of good discussions become arguments because someone used sarcastic or insulting wording. I join Wikipedia because I want to contribute to this incredible work. I believe many here joined for the same reason. Therefore let us agree not spoil Wikipedia by allowing it to become a place argument and ill feeling istead of a place of learning and intellectual discussion. Let Wikipedia be a place above the offices, lunch rooms, and bars. We have enough trouble defending Wikipedia from vandals. Let's not worry about having to defend ourselves from each other. ( Steve 21:32, 3 March 2006 (UTC))
We should have a most accessed documents page and some sort of history page for each account. A message board on hot topics NOT A DISCUSSIONS PAGE but A FULL MESSAGE BOARD
Roxanne Harman ( talk · contribs) claims that she is Willy on Wheels. Anyone want to check out her user page?
I quickly skimmed the archives, but didn't see a discussion on this... why is the community portal located in Wikipedia space rather than Portal space? This is specifically in reference to whether the same issues apply to Wikipedia:Featured content - which was recently moved from Portal:Featured content. I can think of various reasonable issues (relates primarily to Wikipedia rather than articles, integral part of internal community rather than portal for external users, et cetera), but I'm not sure if those are the basis for the community portal's location here and whether they would apply to the featured content portal. Thoughts? There is also discussion of where the featured content portal should be located at Wikipedia talk:Featured content. -- CBDunkerson 12:51, 6 March 2006 (UTC)
Open Systems Interconnection: A set of protocols designed to be an international standard method for connecting unlike computers and networks. Europe has done most of the work developing OSI and will probably use it as soon as possible.
The [edit] links simply don't work; they take you to an interior section on the page, not the subpage edit section, and even worse, they don't even take you to the right interior section on the page. Check it yourself; just mouseover the edit links, read the URLs, and you'll notice that they're not pointing correctly. -- Cyde Weys 05:54, 12 March 2006 (UTC)
It still ain't working. The edit link for "New featured pages" brings up this section:
==New featured content== {{Announcements/New featured pages}} <!--{{signpost-subscription|center}}--> <!-- --> <!-- -------------------------------START SINGLE-COLUMN SECTION------------------------ --> <!-- --> |- | valign="top" colspan=3 style="background:#F6E9F6; border: 0;" |
When of course it should actually open up the transcluded subpage for editing. -- Cyde Weys 02:35, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
No wonder I'm seeing so many edits counter to the MoS--it doesn't even seem to be linked to from here any more. 24.18.215.132 18:12, 17 March 2006 (UTC)
I thought extensive revisions on this page were supposed to be discussed -- at least that's what it says at the top of the page, but the talk page the link points to has only had one discussion since 8 February -- which does not pertain to the drastic changes made on the page in the last 24 hours. -- llywrch 03:25, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
re: top icons, transcluded from Wikipedia:Community Portal/Menu
Those icons are awfully large. Please bear in mind that many users won't like ANY icons, no matter what aesthetic style. Some of us prefer the minimal and clean look of just text, and believe that icons are superfluous especially when used purely for decoration. So if you demand the use of them (and icons anywhere else), please try to keep them non-intrusively sized. thanks. -- Quiddity 09:45, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
I reduced the intro section, which made up for the room taken up by the icon bar, and then you reverted again for the same "above the fold" argument, when that stuff wasn't even viewable the first time you did this anyways. Also, if the icon bar is taken out, the TOC needs to be put back in and the intro re-expanded, so users will know what is on the page. You reverted without looking far enough back in the history to understand the changes that were made. I've reverted again, because the page needs a table of contents, which is what the icon bar has taken the place of. But to accomodate your objection, I've reduced the size of the icons to take up less vertical space, and I reduced the menu item descriptions to 2 lines, saving a line. Of course you could have done this yourself rather than reverting, which was taking a step back rather than a step forward. Fix the problem, don't just revert (because that rarely resolves the whole issue). Fixing the icon bar was just as easy as taking a screen shot and marking it up. -- Go for it! 19:36, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
Stop putting everything inside boxes inside boxes inside boxes. Why does everything have to be enclosed inside 10 levels of boxes? This is horrible web design. What ever happened to using whitespace? Kaldari 22:50, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
Minimalize? Thanks for the feedback. Okay, I'll see what I can do... -- Go for it! 09:36, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
The community portal is a reference page, a place to go to find whatever you are looking for pertaining to the "community" theme. If it isn't here, at least there will be a link taking you there. The icon menu at the top of the page is intended to help users navigate the page more easily, and is a bit clearer than the box TOC we had before. -- Go for it! 13:08, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
The layout looks great now! Thanks to whoever got rid of all the boxes. It's much easier on the eyes now :) Kaldari 22:02, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
To clarify my main approach, it is to introduce a variety of changes, and see which ones stick. On the community portal, neither the colors nor the lines took, but quite a few improvements did:
Each of those improvements were put to immediate advantage by the community, rather than waiting on a draft page for weeks on end. Both major draft projects (Main Page, and Help) died on the vine for many weeks until someone came along and either revived the project or bypassed it altogether. I think the tendency for draft projects to wither is because they are shoved off in a corner somewhere where they are dominated by a fanatic few who tend to drive everyone else who strays in there away (reverting bold edits in favor of some preconceived though incomplete model), and creativity is used up for lack of new blood. Meanwhile there's usually a notice on the real page telling people not to edit it directly. The combination of these two factors may cause a page to stagnate, which may be exactly what happened to the help page before its direct overhaul.
Editing a page directly allows for much more immediate feedback on undesirable changes, such as the aesthetic elements feedback posted above, while retaining the good new elements users like. I think this is the essence of the wiki-model, and its greatest strength, and see no reason to hamper it nor impede it in any way. (Except of course, in the case of excessive vandalism, and then only temporarily). Just my two cents' worth. --
Go for it!
13:49, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
Categories · Glossaries · Lists · Overviews · Portals · Questions · Reference · Site news · A-Z Index
Arts | Biography | Culture | Geography | History | Mathematics | Philosophy | Science | Society | Technology
Please add to discussion on the usefulness of the browsebar/catbar headers,
That is, discussion is underway to remove links from the above bar, as well as remove the bar itself from many of its current locations. We need lots of feedback on this issue, to make sure we aren't about to remove something that gets a lot of use. So if you use the above bar, you need to let us know. Or if you just have an opinion, like how to gather appropriate feedback (!) drop on by and tell us. Do non-editors use the bar? And how do we find this out?! -- Go for it! 22:51, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
The top of the Article Improvement Drive text still shows "Great leap forward and decline of the roman empire" as the current AID articles, but iran and ego, superego, and id are the current ones shown in the excerpts. The text is protected, so I can't fix this. Can someone with access fix it? -- User:Rayc
Done. Thanks for pointing that out. -- Go for it! 23:05, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
Go for it! - Thanks for expanding the policy section. Though, I think we can't emphasize these enough; therefore, they need to be yet more prominent, such as closer to the top of the page. -- Aude ( talk | contribs) 20:46, 24 March 2006 (UTC)
I'll see what I can come up with. Let me stew on it awhile. They don't really fit under "departments" anyways. -- 24.18.171.99 20:12, 25 March 2006 (UTC)
The structure of this page requires some serious reconsideration.
It looks essentially like a number of lists crammed together into boxes, with no clear logic or structure or helpful visual cues.
It is far too large and the structure is far too diffuse (especially in the "by departments" section and below).
The use of acronyms for pages in the Wikipedia namespace clutters the page further. The use of colours makes no sense that I can understand.
There are three separate boxes about "Help".
Things to do and collaborations are in separate places, and there is more similar stuff under "editorial departments".
The template on top replicates some essential content but shows no relation to the structure of the page.
Style guides and other essential guidelines are stuffed away in to a crammed corner at the lower right.
"Editor resources" (I imagine that's what many people will look for here) is in an unrelated place near the bottom where few people will look. And so on, and so on.
Sorry to say, but this portal page looks plain unusable. I have edited Wikipedia for three years and know my ways around, but this beats me. I can not imagine a newbie-to-moderately-advanced user finding an answer to a question or otherwise gaining any profit from using it.
I think a redesign from scratch would be the best idea. And first and foremost, one should think about usability before trying to improve anything. Our current main page might give a few ideas how to uncram information and make a visually helpful structure. Kosebamse 21:51, 25 March 2006 (UTC)
Could we reduce the size of the lefthand column in "Wikipedia by Department" section? We're getting horizontal scrollbars at 800 width. And that will give the 3 columns on the right more room to breathe. Thanks. -- Quiddity 21:56, 25 March 2006 (UTC)
The opening sentance of the Main Community Portal Page has a spelling mistake. Since it is a protected page, I donot know how to correct it. I request someone to please correct it and then delete this message later. Thanks in advance, Ashwin Baindur
"A public collaboration to redesign the Community Portal is currently taking place here. Please contribute and help Wikipedia becaome a more usable place." —Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.145.128.6 ( talk • contribs)
Can we change the purple yellow criss-cross combination?...it's kind of getting annoying. Osbus 02:18, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
Someone chopped off about two thirds of the portal...I like it.-- Osbus 20:23, 29 March 2006 (UTC)
Cropping like this basicaly misunderstands the concept of the portal. This portal is to offer an 'all on one page' access to common comunity tasks. It's not a reader orientated portal, but a functional one. Don't remove functionality without discussion! I'm reverting this whole mess since it was apparently accidental, and done without discussion. -- Barberio 21:11, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
Does anyone like the yellow background?-- Osbus 21:39, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Good Article Collaboration of the week is a nice idea, but is suffering due to people's ignorance of the project. Can I suggest it should have a small box of it's own below 'Article Improvement Drive'?
Maybe something similar to this,
The Good Article Collaboration of the week works to polish already good articles so they are fit to become featured-standard articles. The subject of this week's article improvement drive is History of the Internet.
You can still help with last week's articles, H5N1, or help pick next week's articles.
This is smaller than the other two, since those have a higher rated priority. Good Article Improvement is still needed, since there's a tendancy for articles to get to a 'good' state, but never get that final push needed to bring it up to FAC. -- Barberio 13:34, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
Kmf, I like the way you categorized the posts on the CBB. -- Go for it! 22:31, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
The community bulletin board should be kept at the top (i.e., front and center), because that is the most visible and most easily accessed location for it right now. It's probably a safe assumption that those who make regular use of it will object if we move it. So it should be kept there until we can convince WP's developers to give the CBB its own slot on the navigation menu (right under "Main Page"). -- Go for it! 22:40, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
It is very likely that the Community Bulletin Board is going to continue growing. We have to face the fact that it is extremely popular. Therefore, we really need to accomodate it. I believe the best way to do this, and still minimize the time and actions required to get to the other CP material is to place each major section on its own subpage. Clicking on the menu is a lot faster than scrolling down the page. Also, there may be many users who have a favorite section, which makes the provided shortcuts particulary useful for them (shortcuts / redirects can't be pointed to sections of a page). By splitting up the Community Portal, we decrease the amount of time it takes to get to a desired section. For those who like it all on one page, we can provide a site map as was done for the help menu pages. That way, both camps are served. -- Go for it! 22:49, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
I've started to develop a Site Map for the CP, which pulls in all the sections for those who want to browse it all on one page. Wikipedia:Community Portal/Site map Though there are some formatting bugs that need to be tracked down. Probably a table delimiter or two are missing on the subpages. -- Go for it! 23:17, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
I recomend keeping the Portal as the All in One page. And making a page that is just the Community bulletin board, for those who want just that. Cropping the main portal page would mean it is no longer a portal. -- Barberio 00:04, 1 April 2006 (UTC)
When an editor reverts to say you have not gained consensus for an edit, it's an indication that the edit is so fundamental a change as to require consensus support. If discussion on the talk page has opposed the change, that indicates people don't support it. In both cases you should atempt to generate consensus support for a change.
Editing the page to conform to your own view on what it should be, without regard to consensus, is not a nice thing. Please do not continue to do so. -- Barberio 11:04, 1 April 2006 (UTC)