Wikipedia is getting a new look • Hacker News Board

Re: Wikipedia is getting a new look

#81

Post by Falell » Wed, Sep 23, 2020, 5:30 PM UTC

jrochkind1 wrote: post #36

The detail page for the first feature they mention, limiting line-width [1], makes me think: Wow, it sure takes a lot of analysis and discussion to make what is a pretty straightforward and simple change. (Recall, too, this has been in the works for at least a year? And still isn't deployed to English wikipedia?) Which makes me realize there's sort of an ironic situation. When a site is beginning and small, you don't…

This is the core of "enterprise" things.

Many times clients, (especially paying business clients) care more that "things that worked yesterday should continue to work today" than about the enhancements, or even "breaking fixes", that you want to deliver for your product.

Re: Wikipedia is getting a new look

#82

Post by DocG » Wed, Sep 23, 2020, 5:31 PM UTC

I was scared for a moment that it's going to be another "we added bunch of whitespace, js and hid a bunch of options away for a cleaner look" redesign.

Was pleasantly surprised with the article. I think current Wikipedia is highly functional design that is content thick and practical. Like HN.

Re: Wikipedia is getting a new look

#83

Post by zozbot234 » Wed, Sep 23, 2020, 5:31 PM UTC

SusAnnie wrote: post #52

While there might be a lot of current users who feel like “if it’s not broke why fit it?”, there are a lot of whys it can be improved (some previous commenters have already linked some great research to how line length improves readability). As someone who is very dyslexic, I can say that Wikipedia is incredibly difficult to read, navigate and use effectively as a resource. It is not organized in a way that is easy t…

You can already select a more dyslexic-friendly font for Wikipedia articles. In the side-bar, click the gear icon in the "Languages" sub-header. Select "Display" settings in the resulting box, then the "Fonts" tab and check the "Download fonts as needed" option. This will reveal a further option to switch the font for main content in your current language. Select OpenDyslexic in the drop-down box, then Apply Settings. As you can see, it's really easy and usable even for newcomer folks!

Re: Wikipedia is getting a new look

#84

Post by kevin_thibedeau » Wed, Sep 23, 2020, 5:32 PM UTC

jvzr wrote: post #32

Thaxll wrote: post #6

I don't know why they did that, now we have empty space on the left and right, it's really useless, why is it better than using the full screen? "Our second change introduces a maximum line width to our content on pages where reading is the focus, such as article pages and discussion pages. Research has shown that limiting the width can lead to better retention of the content itself, as well as a decrease in eye stra…

You haven't used a ultra widescreen monitor then. Reading Wikipedia (until today) on such screen was pretty hard, with sometimes a full paragraph on a single, long line. This change is much better. As for the sidebar (which you don't talk about, I realize) it's very useful for non-English speakers: it's easy to switch from the local page to the English one, and I've used it quite a lot. For switching to other languag…

Why would you maximize window width on an ultra widescreen? That isn't much of a value proposition for (Western) text consumption.

Re: Wikipedia is getting a new look

#85

Post by rwesty » Wed, Sep 23, 2020, 5:33 PM UTC

I really like how they have opted to make small changes gradually. Look at the feature lists here https://m.mediawiki.org/wiki/Reading/Web/Desktop_Improvement.... There's a detailed explanation for why each change is being made complimented by a GIF showing the side by side difference. I've been working on an SPA with a tight deadline and we are building new pages almost every other day. It's nice to see a project take a slow and careful approach.

Re: Wikipedia is getting a new look

#86

Post by drng » Wed, Sep 23, 2020, 5:33 PM UTC

If you have an account (and stay logged in) you can get some of the benefits described in the article with an alternative skin (collapsed menu, limited line width, maybe a better font). Check out the options in the Appearance section of your user preferences.

I like MinervaNeue (sample page here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Anglo-Saxon_England...)

Re: Wikipedia is getting a new look

#87

Post by davidivadavid » Wed, Sep 23, 2020, 5:34 PM UTC

jrochkind1 wrote: post #36

The detail page for the first feature they mention, limiting line-width [1], makes me think: Wow, it sure takes a lot of analysis and discussion to make what is a pretty straightforward and simple change. (Recall, too, this has been in the works for at least a year? And still isn't deployed to English wikipedia?) Which makes me realize there's sort of an ironic situation. When a site is beginning and small, you don't…

Thanks for the link — that subject has been my #1 complaint with Wikipedia for a long time.

I'm glad they're finally doing something about it, even though it seems like I still won't be happy with it — judging by the wikis where the update is active, it's still too wide.

The rationale in the article is interesting, but IMO wrong — the idea that you need to balance scannability and line length suggests that line length is the main factor in improving scannability, when it seems obvious that what wikis have been missing for a while is better, probably sticky tables of contents for quick navigation (which something like Wikiwand figured out a while back).

Making users scroll 25% less is a poor solution to improve scannability, and degrades readability tremendously.

There are issues tied to the variability of layouts on Wikipedia that are more legitimate (how to deal with boxes, etc.) and would involve deeper design changes, but they would probably be worth it considering how important the basic reading experience is to wikipedia.

Re: Wikipedia is getting a new look

#88

Post by daniel2x » Wed, Sep 23, 2020, 5:34 PM UTC

petters wrote: post #59

Uehreka wrote: post #19

If someone asked me to critique the UX of Wikipedia, the first two things I’d point out would be that I almost never use the left hand side bar (and I have a feel almost no one does) and that when paragraphs are that wide they become harder to read (especially when they snake around floated images). Not changing for 10 years, watching as some trends fade and others become law-of-the-land, and then making two changes…

This is how I use the fullscreen expandable images: 1: Go to a page. 2: Click on an image. 3: Close the image. 4: Click the browser back button. I am now at the image again. This is surprising and I cannot seem to learn this.

There is a setting to disable it.

You're welcome.

Re: Wikipedia is getting a new look

#89

Post by cuddlybacon » Wed, Sep 23, 2020, 5:35 PM UTC

thibran wrote: post #68

Uehreka wrote: post #19

If someone asked me to critique the UX of Wikipedia, the first two things I’d point out would be that I almost never use the left hand side bar (and I have a feel almost no one does) and that when paragraphs are that wide they become harder to read (especially when they snake around floated images). Not changing for 10 years, watching as some trends fade and others become law-of-the-land, and then making two changes…

> I almost never use the left hand side bar (and I have a feel almost no one does) If you speak different languages, the left hand bar is very useful to switch between different language versions of an article.

True. But the gif in the article indicates they intend to move the language selector to a more prominent location.

Re: Wikipedia is getting a new look

#90

Post by nickosmark » Wed, Sep 23, 2020, 5:36 PM UTC

Wikimedia recently decided to abandon their in-house javascript framework in favor of Vue.js[0]. That doesn't mean wikipedia will turn into a vue.js single page app but they'll use it to progressively enhance some parts of the frontend or their internal tools/editors etc. Looking at some of the suggested features like the new search[1] it seems that vue.js could be used in this scenario. Does that mean they'll ship the entire vue.js runtime alongside jquery that is already used?

[0] https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T241180 [1] https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Reading/Web/Desktop_Improveme...