Explore Wikipedia's New Look

#1

Post by zebracanevra » Wed, Jan 18, 2023, 4:49 PM UTC

Explore Wikipedia's New Look
wikimediafoundation.org

Re: Explore Wikipedia's New Look

#2

Post by emehex » Wed, Jan 18, 2023, 5:03 PM UTC

Gut reaction: I hate it. But I'll probably get used to it...

Re: Explore Wikipedia's New Look

#3

Post by skyyler » Wed, Jan 18, 2023, 5:14 PM UTC

emehex wrote: post #2

Gut reaction: I hate it. But I'll probably get used to it...

Same! I absolutely hate the amount of empty space everywhere on my 1080p screen.

Re: Explore Wikipedia's New Look

#4

Post by wormslayer666 » Wed, Jan 18, 2023, 5:54 PM UTC

Lots of whitespace, lots of unnecessary animations, and lots of floating bars I'd never click occupying screen space. Hopefully this isn't too hard to fix with browser extensions.

Re: Explore Wikipedia's New Look

#5

Post by zebracanevra » Wed, Jan 18, 2023, 6:01 PM UTC

emehex wrote: post #2

Gut reaction: I hate it. But I'll probably get used to it...

Yeah, same reaction for me... I've always liked the small gradients on the top and the long list of things down the left side which I never click. Felt homely. I'll miss it.

Re: Explore Wikipedia's New Look

#6

Post by psacawa » Wed, Jan 18, 2023, 6:02 PM UTC

Good:

- Sidebar for navigation

Bad:

- Wasted screen space

- Other languages are not available as a simple anchor tag anymore. They are hidden behind elements. It's annoying for readers who consult their own language and en.wikipedia.org in the same session. It breaks my bookmarklet to change languages, which depended on something like `document.querySelectorAll('a')`

Re: Explore Wikipedia's New Look

#7

Post by ashton314 » Wed, Jan 18, 2023, 6:41 PM UTC

My initial take: I actually like this a lot. The body text is narrower which makes for easier reading. The sidebar with an updating highlight of current place in document is really nice too. I don't mind the "wasted space": Wikipedia is primarily about reading, and any well typeset book or web page should have generous margins so the line length is not too long.

Re: Explore Wikipedia's New Look

#8

Post by slimginz » Wed, Jan 18, 2023, 7:00 PM UTC

For people who don't like the new look, you can go to preferences->Appearance and select 'Vector (Legacy)'. It does require you to login first which is annoying but at least you can easily go back to the old look.

Edit: You can also have it take up the entire width by hitting the button in the bottom right. Doesn't seem to remember the change for me though so hopefully they add that in soon.

Re: Explore Wikipedia's New Look

#9

Post by chazeon » Wed, Jan 18, 2023, 7:01 PM UTC

Have been using this new theme since beta. I love the much cleaner look more than the previous one. One can always tune the CSS yourself at the user's preference near the theme selector. The only thing I need to adjust to my liking is to limit the line width:

    main#content {
      max-width: 40em;
    }

For those who hate it: you will always have the option to switch back to the old theme.

I really hope any website could be as flexible as Wikipedia to allow users to write their own CSS.

Re: Explore Wikipedia's New Look

#10

Post by Fauntleroy » Wed, Jan 18, 2023, 7:09 PM UTC

psacawa wrote: post #6

Good: - Sidebar for navigation Bad: - Wasted screen space - Other languages are not available as a simple anchor tag anymore. They are hidden behind elements. It's annoying for readers who consult their own language and en.wikipedia.org in the same session. It breaks my bookmarklet to change languages, which depended on something like `document.querySelectorAll('a')`

Even in the new design the line length is way too long. I get complaints about wasted screen space, but you really don't want lines of text blasting all the way across the screen either.