proposal to change the wiki presentation

Hi all,

So, I'm still reading the wiki to see where I can improve things in a
first step:
- I would like to modify the presentation of this page:
https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Documentation
to look like this one:
https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Documentation/fr
that I found more readable and direct

- the same for the macro page:
https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Macros
to look like this one
https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Macros/fr

- I would like to reference all the videos here
https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Documentation/Other_Documentation_and_Resources#Video_Tutorials

in our official youtube channel:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCQAClQkZEm2rkWvU5bvCAXQ/playlists
and then point directly the link to the relevant playlists on the wiki
that would display like this
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL0pdzjvYW9RFFHskLsq3Rvb5NpoFi_ud2

Please, let me know if you agree with those changes, I'll do them over
the week-end.
Thanks!
Sophie

Hi all,

So, I'm still reading the wiki to see where I can improve things in a
first step:
- I would like to modify the presentation of this page:
https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Documentation
to look like this one:
https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Documentation/fr
that I found more readable and direct

- the same for the macro page:
https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Macros
to look like this one
https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Macros/fr

Hi,

This is a great idea. But I think it's better to use a style like this
https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Main_Page

The best regards,
Lera

+1
--Jean

Hi :slight_smile:
+1
We've not looked at the wiki much and it's a bit of a mess.

We could even agree to avoid spaces in urls or anything.

Underscores trend to be hard to see because most times that urls are shown
they are made blue and underlined. Spaces often get replaced by %20 so the
url suddenly becomes almost unreadable.
Regards from
Tom :slight_smile:

I find dark blue links on dark green background harder to read than on
the pale "green", but that's just my 2c.

Alex

Hi, Alex.

I agree with you partly. And I think that links in a title of a table isn't a
good idea. But wiki pages in the section EN use LibreOfficeColor-backgrond2 and
LibreOfficeColor-fontcolor templates. And we should use them in order to our
designers can change style in all pages easier.
I think that this question makes sense to raise in mail list Desing
(design@global.libreoffice.org).

Best regards,
Lera

Hi *,

This message aims to keep a note in this mailing list and follow the
discussion I had with sophi on the IRC channel #libreoffice-dev.

While the current Documentation/fr presentation is really clear and in
accordance with the Keep It Simple Stupid principle I love, I
recommend you to rethink the use of horizontal scares.

This is really annoying on mobile devices, especially as the wiki does
not have a mobile version. This is not a responsive website, this is a
wiki after where content must be vertical.

Simply use vertical titles like this:

= Documentation =

== For users ==

== For contributors ==

== For developers ==

Adding scares with colors are really awful on the code side: you have
<div> and hardcoded colors everywhere.

But if you really want to keep that horizontal layout, please take
example on the Arch Linux wiki [1] which is light and still readable
on mobile devices, because the layout is not cluttered.

But, yeah, the English doc page requires a new rewrite. I even wanted
to do it by myself, when I browsed info for LOWN, but yet didn't find
the time to do it.

And after LOWN 5 is published today, I'm gonna add more information
what the guides from the publication page are about, especially the
sevral Base guides we have.

Regards,

[1] https://wiki.archlinux.org/

- --
William Gathoye
<william@gathoye.be>

Hi,

I think that view of tables is nice and clear. View for mobile platforms
should not be in the design for desktop, but we need to install an extension
for these platforms. As far as I know, there is such extension for MediaWiki.
About <div>. Yes, I agree with you. It is desirable to move all styles into
the template. But, who will develop the template now? If you or somebody else
makes a good template for a table, I can spend time for bringing all the pages
into a single view.

Best regards,
Lera

Hi sophi,

Well, sorry for not being responsive, that was diner time and had
people home.

No problem.

I don't know what is 'scares', could you explain that ?

Sorry typos, *squares obviously.

you're the first person complaining about the need to have the
wiki mobile compliant. I don't think the documentation is much read
on phones currently.

It was not only related to the ability to read the wiki easily on a
small screen.

But I don't understand the point in trying to transform a Wiki as if
it was a simple website.

* When the new contributor wants to update some piece of information
on the wiki, when using square boxes, he must double check if is does
not break anything. Too much HTML code.

* This adds even more complexity if you want to reuse the wiki in
other projects like exporting the documentation content to the help
files, etc. (I saw some mails about this, I even reported a topic on
this in LOWN).

When I try to compare the MediaWiki to other tools TDF uses, I have
the impression the main website plays a really minor role here. The
wiki seems at the contrary to embrace every others platform.

Even if you are not redesigning the whole wiki, here are some easy
improvement ideas:

* Like on the ArchLinux wiki [1], integrate the website menu on the
wiki (2 simple PHP include instructions).

* Merge the wiki menu top bar template with the website menu: just a
bit more content to add in the "Contribution" tab.

* Why is the language list located at the top in the wiki while you
have the default left margin dedicated to this usage? --> Losing
vertical space for no reason.

* Why are you adding so much ways to access a simple information. So
much Welcome pages. Just use the welcome pages from the wiki, instead
of rewriting exactly the same content in
http://www.libreoffice.org/community/docs-team/ --> Basically most of
the main website pages should link directly to the wiki.

* Each team is using different layouts on the wiki. Keep It Simple Stupid.

* Using dedicated ODT files for all documentation adds too much
complexity to solve a simple issue/typo. I just got bored to log me in
to OdfAuthors, aka "the documentation team abomination".

I'll ask Dennis' help here and will apply the templates he has
done.

Yet another evidence, a contributor nearly needs web development
skills to be able to write wiki content now.

I won't redesign all the wiki, but only keep the look and feel
currently applied by Dennis. But again I'll ask him the best way to
achieve it, he has done a lot of work on the templates and the
pages.

The simplest way to avoid content duplication, and to give the user
the impression he is always travelling on the SAME platform is to have
the same menu everywhere. Again Arch Linux is, I think, an example to
follow.

You still can do it after I've worked on them :slight_smile:

On the Arch Linux wiki I do not hesitate to merge pages, etc. Here,
I'm still rather new in active contribution. :wink:

Thanks for highlighting the work done by the project!

Great pleasure, LOWN acts as a summary for myself and others, as a
help for the annual report, and as a marketing tool.

Regards,

[1] https://wiki.archlinux.org
[2] https://pad.documentfoundation.org/p/annualreport

- --
William Gathoye
<william@gathoye.be>

Hi William,

Hi sophi,

Well, sorry for not being responsive, that was diner time and
had people home.

No problem.

I don't know what is 'scares', could you explain that ?

Sorry typos, *squares obviously.

you're the first person complaining about the need to have the
wiki mobile compliant. I don't think the documentation is much
read on phones currently.

It was not only related to the ability to read the wiki easily on
a small screen.

But I don't understand the point in trying to transform a Wiki as
if it was a simple website.

For this discussion, you should post on the website list or open
tickets on redmine for what you want to change. I'm not in charge of
the templates used and will only follow the design already there.

* When the new contributor wants to update some piece of
information on the wiki, when using square boxes, he must double
check if is does not break anything. Too much HTML code.

* This adds even more complexity if you want to reuse the wiki in
other projects like exporting the documentation content to the
help files, etc. (I saw some mails about this, I even reported a
topic on this in LOWN).

When I try to compare the MediaWiki to other tools TDF uses, I
have the impression the main website plays a really minor role
here. The wiki seems at the contrary to embrace every others
platform.

yes, that is the primary tool used by the community, websites are only
for download and statical infos.

Even if you are not redesigning the whole wiki, here are some easy
improvement ideas:

* Like on the ArchLinux wiki [1], integrate the website menu on
the wiki (2 simple PHP include instructions).

* Merge the wiki menu top bar template with the website menu: just
a bit more content to add in the "Contribution" tab.

* Why is the language list located at the top in the wiki while
you have the default left margin dedicated to this usage? -->
Losing vertical space for no reason.

* Why are you adding so much ways to access a simple information.
So much Welcome pages. Just use the welcome pages from the wiki,
instead of rewriting exactly the same content in
http://www.libreoffice.org/community/docs-team/ --> Basically most
of the main website pages should link directly to the wiki.

* Each team is using different layouts on the wiki. Keep It Simple
Stupid.

* Using dedicated ODT files for all documentation adds too much
complexity to solve a simple issue/typo. I just got bored to log me
in to OdfAuthors, aka "the documentation team abomination".

I'll ask Dennis' help here and will apply the templates he has
done.

Yet another evidence, a contributor nearly needs web development
skills to be able to write wiki content now.

I won't redesign all the wiki, but only keep the look and feel
currently applied by Dennis. But again I'll ask him the best way
to achieve it, he has done a lot of work on the templates and
the pages.

The simplest way to avoid content duplication, and to give the
user the impression he is always travelling on the SAME platform is
to have the same menu everywhere. Again Arch Linux is, I think, an
example to follow.

You still can do it after I've worked on them :slight_smile:

On the Arch Linux wiki I do not hesitate to merge pages, etc.
Here, I'm still rather new in active contribution. :wink:

so go on website and discuss the design with the wiki admin team (but
be aware that several NLPs won't follow either).

Thanks for highlighting the work done by the project!

Great pleasure, LOWN acts as a summary for myself and others, as a
help for the annual report, and as a marketing tool.

As I already told you, the annual report will be based on the pad
info, one place for the writers is the best and a global overview is
wanted, so add the info you see relevant to it.

Kind regards
Sophie

- --
Sophie Gautier sophie.gautier@documentfoundation.org
Tel:+33683901545
Co-founder - Release coordinator
Certification Committee Member
The Document Foundation