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The question wasn't one of aesthetics, but of usability (I agree that the centered content is more aesthetically pleasing).
I believe the left-aligned version is clearer, and more easily understood as giving just examples of the content found in the subpages; Also, with regards to this page going against our manual-of-style recommendations of not linking headers. Anyone else? -- Quiddity (talk) 22:50, 23 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
A general project
I'd like to develop an alternative introduction to Wikipedia that is not focused on how to edit, but rather how to get acquainted with Wikipedia. How to use the History tab to see what's happened to an article, why getting an account and using a watchlist might be helpful even if you don't plan on editing anytime soon, how talk pages and archives work. Maybe also how the administrative end of things works: how people get admin or bureaucrat rights, what those rights are, how deletion and merge decisions are made, how consensus works in general. If anybody's interested in collaborating on this, please contact me. -Pete (talk) 21:18, 24 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I agree - there is no need to bombard users with all of the editing help and info from the off, just a genle intro and link to all the editing help would do, there are a lot of duplicate links on the help pages leaving it a little confusing - but everything can be improved eh? I recommend using Wikipedia:Help Project as a base camp, it is somewhat inactive but seems to be the place to start ( I have suggested putting it's banner on relevent help talk pages so that good natured editors such as yourselves are led to a central discussion area rather than the isolated mists of little watched pages). I know of at least one other editor keen to fire the project up again... :note there's also a smaller more directed Wikipedia:WikiProject Contents. LeeVJ (talk) 23:41, 15 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Absolutely! I am a newly signed up user who would just like to make the most basic of comments on errors noticed in articles or minor changes to them now and then. Every time I've wished to do so, I've come to help and begun reading because this wiki stuff isn't exactly user-friendly. I feel encouraged by those bits about anyone being able to contribute, and advising people to "be brave" and add something. After a half hour of non-progress I start to think I'll just leave the correction for others. Sometimes I then think; well, it would be nice to learn how to do this once and for all. Couple hours of reading later, having been bounced around to a dozen pages, informed of umpteen additional policy, mark-up and guideline documents I still need to familiarize myself with, having become utterly overwhelmed by a storm of information and still having next to zero knowledge of how to do something as simple as customize the CSS for how I see the site without incurring the wrath of God, I always do decide to leave it to others! I've nearly mastered HTML, Javascript, CSS, Objective C, and Perl, but the so-called help on this site is the most unfriendly, daunting, bewildering disaster I've ever encountered. There must be a way to get people like myself acquainted with the site and the details of contributing in a step by step way instead making it feel like trying to get a Phd in a day. Deinonychus rex (talk) 11:25, 11 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Did anything come out of this? I don't know how to locate this page, if it exists. Is there discussion of this proposal somewhere else at Wikipedia? Ottawahitech (talk) 20:36, 13 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, but it's not a simple as first thought ! Wikipedia:Help Project is more active now and we have sorted some bits out, outlined others and work is still in progress. apart from general tidying up and fixing a large number of articles the main pages relevant to this thread stem from Help:Help -> Help:Getting started (several new introductions that are meant to cover everything and not lose the reader)), Category:Wikipedia help is cleaner and another recent drive by a lone editor is reader help (see Category:Reader help). We're not there yet but any help or suggestions much appreciated ! Lee∴V(talk • contribs)21:16, 13 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I was looking through the help files and saw a link to [Pages Needing Attention] under the heading of [Resources and Lists], and when I clicked on it I saw it was marked as an inactive page and retained only for historical reference.
Maybe that should be noted on the main page, and the link move somewhere down below, seperating it from the rest of the help section.
Link to article problems page or "Contact Wikipedia" at top
There are Foundation-level discussions in progress of how to deal with our BLP problems - which are probably Wikipedia's biggest problem with relations to the outside world. Sue Gardner (WMF executive director) started a discussion on foundation-l (see start of thread here).
One of the biggest problems is that people don't know who to contact about a bad article about themselves.
FAT52
Birgitte suggested that people with a problem are as likely to hit "Help" as "Contact Wikipedia". I ran some statistics (1, 2) showing the "Help" link in the sidebar gets almost as many hits as the "Contact Wikipedia" link. And noted I'd be mentioning it here.
So. Given a reader's idea of "help" may not match our prior neat categories of what we want to offer as "help" ... I think we really should try a link at the top of the "help" page to Wikipedia:Contact us and Wikipedia:Contact us/Article problem.
I realise the page is cluttered as it is (and could do with reorganisation), but this is a serious problem and these could be really useful to the reader. - David Gerard (talk) 09:39, 3 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Feel free to have a stab at it, or suggest a specific location. I don't think many people are watching this page (sadly). eg. would you suggest within this page somewhere (you say "at the top", but might under the "Communication in the project" header be ok?), or in the {{WP help pages (header bar)}} somewhere? I've made an initial go of it...
I left a suggestion for a potential merge/overhaul between Wikipedia:Questions and Wikipedia:Contact us in September '06, and still think that might be worth considering.
It should be on this page, and where you've put it is where it would presently go ...
I'd like to stick it at the top, really prominently, for people who see an article on them with rubbish, go "what on earth!" and click "Help!!" in the hope of finding help. I'm assuming they won't read the page - from this usage perspective, it's presently hidden in a wall of text.
I'd like to put a row in a different colour at the top, with "Article problem?" and "Contact us" in it, for at least a week and see if the hits on the article help pages go up. (stats.grok.se is so useful!) If they do, it was needed - if not, it wasn't.
Feel free to edit my sandbox, or throw your own together. It's brainstorming time...
(sidenote: I'm sure someone asked that a link to "Contact us" get removed from some prominent place about a year ago, because otrs was getting too many cranks and kids deluging the queue - however I've searched everywhere likely (all the redesigns i've watched or been involved in), and can't find it. (Not that it matters, all experiments are reversible![except the exceptions]))
Yeah ... I wouldn't like to instruction-creep the help header. That's why I didn't just add the header, all extra words are bad until proven necessary!
Test header up. It's not ornate in the least, but it'll do. Note bright prominent obnoxiousness. Tweaks OK. The design point is to be the first thing someone sees on the page, so upset people know where to go about a real problem.
It's a bit in your face and pushes the rest of the items down the page :( I agree a restructure may be needed, the questions etc at the bottom look a bit lost /out of context. I'm not sure about making access for reporting problem articles is more than other questions, but can see your point... maybe a reordering / rationalisation of the sections could be implemented - say with the first section being 'report a problem' subsections factual error / copyright issue, which would make it easier to find and still fit in with the remainder of sections? LeeVJ (talk) 19:42, 15 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
The results
I said a week, didn't I? *blush* Well, no-one zapped it in that time! The numbers from stats.grok.se show March hits so far as:
Wikipedia:Contact us - 253665 (up from 232227 in Feb and down from 279774 in Jan)
The increased hits on "article problem" may be worth the effort. The increased hits on "Contact us" not so much. What do you all think? - David Gerard (talk) 21:35, 30 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I have no helpful insights, hence am keeping quiet.
It's really up to whoever has to deal with the influx, I guess.
Right place to ask, low quantity of people watching though.
Your sandbox rewrite looks like a good start. Once you're happy with it, feel free to overwrite/update the actual page. -- Quiddity (talk) 17:34, 10 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Ouch
Far too much info on this page; no idea what to click for the best. Can't it be clarified? Like, distinct headings - help for people reading Wikipedia, help for beginner editors, help for experienced editors? (I'm not a beginner, but I'm imagining I am, and I think I would be overawed by this page.)--The Early Knight (talk) 18:53, 17 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I'll second that sentiment. Howcan we provide a simplified walkthrough of the core areas as a guide to this wonderful bounty of information, more like the tabbed Tutorial pages? +sj+11:46, 10 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Wikipedia:FAQ/categories has the following statement:
"When using the search box, it is possible to restrict your search to articles in a particular category. To do this, just add +incategory:"CategoryName" to the search string."
I'm not quite sure how this works. I didn't get any results when I did a search for:
Why the new article suggestions on this talk page?
Twist fan and Jeannieb's recent posts are examples of the influx of topics on this talk page that I think are new article requests. I am not sure why they are posted to this page, maybe there is some misleading documentation somewhere? Perhaps someone can add an edit notice or warning on this talk page to avoid these kind of posts. Someone should welcome and explain to these users the right way to request a new article (if that is what they are trying to do).--Commander Keane (talk) 07:40, 4 August 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Helping other languages and Projects improve their help pages
Are there efforts to synchronize these pages with help pages on meta, MediaWiki, and other major language-projects? For instance, there are only Help site map equivalents on a few language editions of Wikipedia. There is a lot of information here, and it's not clear that newbies find it friendly (cf. the comment above, and the feedback so far from the usability project), but it is extremely useful for long-time editors and the en:wp collection is one of the best around. +sj+11:47, 10 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Not that I know of. There's some recent activity to improve our own help pages, being coordinated at Wikipedia:Help Project (just a few people currently). It would definitely be a good idea to do so, though.
I've wanted to look into this myself, but I haven't spent enough time at meta to feel confident that I know the whole Help hierarchy, or all the ramifications of bold action there... -- Quiddity (talk) 19:17, 10 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
A couple of new high level help pages
We have just unleashed several new help pages aimed first time users/would be editors, Help:Help whose first paragraph links to Help:Getting started, which itself provides links to a couple of lovingly crafted introductions ( 'talk pages' and 'guidelines/policies'). We hope to fully integrate them and other newbie help pages into something a little more cohesive than the prexisting help. More eyes and ideas would be welcome, but I can't quite decide where to link them in - a link 'about help' to help:help, maybe a 'first time users' link to Help:getting started for now..? Lee∴V(talk • contribs)00:38, 9 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Can someone knowledgeable please add sections or clear links to guidance and examples of syntax to use for linking to images in Wikimedia Commons. The only thing I can see is a comment that the same syntax works for Commons as for WP, but this is clearly not the case, it just does not work. Even adding "commons:" into the link makes no difference. Can someone please explain how to do it, and put the explanation and examples in an easily found place. Thanks. -- Bricaniwi (talk) 08:43, 8 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
You do it the same way as if the file is hosted on English Wikipedia, no difference in syntax. In other words - it just works. Eg [[File:Frog.jpg|thumb|A frog example]] displays the image from Commons A frog example. Now, where to make this clearer in the documentation? I suppose the flow is (from following links):
OK, I've tried again today, using exactly the same syntax I used at first, and it worked this time, thanks.
Is there a delay between when I successfully upload an image to Commons, and when it becomes available for me to link to in WP? Is there an overnight refresh or something? It's certainly not real-time. If there is a delay this should also be noted in each of the Help pages too, to save others hair-tearing. Also, if there is a delay, how do people know when the image is ready to be linked to? This info too should be published in the wikis and Commons. -- Bricaniwi (talk) 01:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
There should not be a delay, for example I will save an image here that was uploaded less than 3 minutes ago to check that it is working. Perhaps the server had a hiccup when you uploaded.--Commander Keane (talk) 03:38, 10 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Is this page's name correct?
The article page name is "Help:Contents/Images and media", but this Talk page's name is merely "Help talk:Contents". Is this a technical glitch? Maybe that's why quite a few sections here are very general, only vaguely related to Images and media. Thoughts? -- Bricaniwi (talk) 08:54, 8 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Regarding Pretzels new draft at Help:Contents/Draft, I like the slightly clearer annotations for the "ask a question" section, but dislike the removal of the searchbox parameters, and dislike giving the tipoftheday more prominence. -- Quiddity (talk) 21:41, 17 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for your feedback Quiddity. I've shrunken the Tip of the Day box in half, and expanded the Questions section - does that look better? I took out the search checkboxes as I thought they would make no sense to most users, and they're available on the search results page anyhow. — PretzelsHii!22:32, 17 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Questions/Totd looks much better like that.
The search feature needs to search those 3 (or 4) namespaces by default (namespaces=Help**,Wikipedia**,Template**,Category). If you can make the search box use those namespaces by default without displaying them, then that's fine too. Otherwise, those parameters need to remain. -- Quiddity (talk) 00:54, 18 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for explaining. I used the prefix: parameter to search just the Help namespace, but can't see a way of either searching multiple namespaces like that, or hiding the checkboxes, so I suppose they will have to return. — PretzelsHii!01:20, 18 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for your efforts! I've made a few adjustments to the draft - mainly to do with the questions box. I've restored the "report a problem" phrasing to the box title - see above. I also changed the layout to match the main box. This is better for consistency, however the main motivation was that the explanations were a fairly long way from the links themselves on a widescreen monitor. For balance I made the questions and TOTD boxes equal widths. I also removed the "where to ask a question" links to streamline the page, but I don't really care if these come back. For much the same reason, I removed the link to the Help Project page. I'll add a link to this to Help:Help.
As an aside, whilst thinking about this update I've come to the conclusion that the whole structure of Help:Contents needs to be redesigned. In particular, there is significant overlap between the communication and community subpages. Yet merging these would cause the list on the main page to become unbalanced. So I began working on this redesign as more of a cleanup exercise because there are still too many overlapping pages in the help system. Once this has improved (which I think is still at least 2 years away) a true redesign involving both the main page and the subpages / categories would definitely be welcome. - Gareth Aus (talk) 04:32, 18 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Fantastic final cleanup. Full support for implementing that.
I'm much in agreement with your other conclusions. Yeah, the MoS overhaul and Help overhaul (both in slow fitful wiki progress) need to do more work, before we can substantially rework the interface to them. -- Quiddity (talk) 07:19, 18 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
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