Hi all. As I've said previously, I've been working on a revamp of the main page. You can find it here. Rather than going through a laborious CT, let's just talk it out here and see if anyone has any questions or concerns. To give a little bit of insight:
- The tour in the first slide is not completed, but it doesn't have to go in the slider right away if this main page goes up soon.
- Featured articles, which here I call "featured fanon," is now in the slider as an image rather than 300 words of text. That saves a lot of space.
- The User of the Month is in the slider now.
- The main page explains what SWFanon, fanon, and fan fic are. Special thanks to Goodwood for co-writing the "What is Star Wars Fanon?" section.
- Featured works, now called "Featured fiction," is still on the main page. That requires text, whereas FAs don't.
- I've added a blog feed, a Twitter feed, and a Facebook box so readers can engage with new kinds of content here and on social media. Once those are on the main page, Twitter and Facebook will be updated regularly.
Any thoughts? Questions? Concerns? - Brandon Rhea(talk) 15:29, May 22, 2013 (UTC)
Discussion[]
"Laborious CT"…
In order to ensure our security and continuing stability, the Republic will be reorganized into the first Galactic Empire, for a safe and secure society…
—Joseph Stalin
- Am I seeing tables in the code? Search engines don't really like them, and they can be a bit rigid.
- Splendid otherwise. TK-999 (Talk) 16:44, May 22, 2013 (UTC)
- Oh right, I meant to change that to templates. Stay tuned. - Brandon Rhea(talk) 16:49, May 22, 2013 (UTC)
- I know I haven't been following all the revamp stuff that's been going on, but I noticed in your Main Page test, there's no "Current Events" and "Did You Know" sections. Are we doing away with those? I always thought the Did You Know section was kind of fun. -
Profile – Talk – 18:33, May 22, 2013 (UTC)
- Current Events hasn't been updated in years, plus the community messages on Wiki Activity (and Sitenotice for Monobook) don't make it all that necessary. Did You Know can be fun, but I've never seen it be all that successful. It remains static for too long. - Brandon Rhea(talk) 18:40, May 22, 2013 (UTC)
- I like the look! Maybe I'm just not seeing it, but is there any plan to put GAs on there somewhere? I'm not too concerned about them, seeing as they're far less important than FAs or FWs, but I figured I'd check. Savage1138 21:17, May 22, 2013 (UTC)
- I'd rather put it in the wiki nav. In the last year, we've only had 5 new GAs so having the same static, random rotation of GAs over and over just isn't worth it to me. - Brandon Rhea(talk) 23:34, May 22, 2013 (UTC)
- I like it. The only question I have is whether or not the "Fanon" and "Fan Fiction" sections will remain static or if there'll be a rotation (i.e., is that where the FAs go?). Other than that, it might be a good idea to center the slideshow if possible (in Monobook it is on the left side of the top, leaving a big ol' empty space).
GoodwoodDebating Society11,988 Edits 00:41, May 23, 2013 (UTC)
- I would like to rotate the images in the Fanon and Fan Fiction sections every so often. That said, the FA is in the slider. It's completely image-based here, rather than image and text. That frees up a lot of space and makes it less text-heavy. As for the slider, that's not doable. You're seeing the empty space because Monobook doesn't have a main page ad. The default layout does, so there's an ad next to the slider there and the slider can't be moved over. - Brandon Rhea(talk) 02:09, May 23, 2013 (UTC)
- We could set up a random image template for each section, selecting by popular vote which pictures (a quality infobox image for Featured Fanon, and a quality cover art for the Featured Fiction bit). The random image could possibly link to the article from which it was pulled, adding incentive to nominate ones that not only represent good art, but good articles. Just a suggestion, at any rate.
- I would like to rotate the images in the Fanon and Fan Fiction sections every so often. That said, the FA is in the slider. It's completely image-based here, rather than image and text. That frees up a lot of space and makes it less text-heavy. As for the slider, that's not doable. You're seeing the empty space because Monobook doesn't have a main page ad. The default layout does, so there's an ad next to the slider there and the slider can't be moved over. - Brandon Rhea(talk) 02:09, May 23, 2013 (UTC)
GoodwoodDebating Society11,988 Edits 02:33, May 23, 2013 (UTC)
- I like that idea in theory, but the concern I have is that it would just be a popularity contest. Whether an image is of quality is subjective, and people can vote for their friends' image if they want. I'd honestly just defer to a neutral admin. - Brandon Rhea(talk) 02:36, May 23, 2013 (UTC)
- While I'm disappointed by the loss of the "Did You Know" section, I do like the new layout. The use of the slider, plus adding the Blog posts in the right column, are good ideas. - Profile – Talk – 15:11, May 23, 2013 (UTC)
Revamp is live[]
The revamp is now live at Star Wars Fanon Wiki. To address a few points that were made earlier in this thread:
- TK said that the tables should be templates. I tried to make them templates earlier today but unfortunately my knowledge of main page coding is too limited to do a conversion that worked. If you'd like to convert it to templates, TK, by all means please do!
- Savage asked about whether GAs would remain. The Featured Fanon proposal put aside for the moment, I've gone ahead and added links to both GAs and FAs to the Fanon box.
- Goodwood asked whether the Fanon and Fan Fiction boxes would remain static. For the Fanon box at least, I've added the current FA's image to that. I figure that in addition to the slider, the image from the current FA can also be in the Fanon box. As far as the Fan Fiction box goes, that can also be rotated every so often. This can be something the admins can do, rather than needing a process for it.
Let me know if you have any additional questions! - Brandon Rhea(talk) 00:34, August 19, 2013 (UTC)
- That's great, Brandon, much better. It's way less cluttered and far more informative then it was, and it is easily noticeable right away, which is great. I did have to fix some links that still pointed to Bob, though...
. Savage1138 13:39, August 19, 2013 (UTC) - And the conversion is done! Please report if anything got broken! TK-999 (Talk) 14:50, August 19, 2013 (UTC)
The columns are not aligned properly, because the right-hand one is too big:
Can you reduce the width of the right-hand column, as it was originally when I put it up? The left-hand column should be 67%, while the right-hand one should fill the other 33%. Thanks. - Brandon Rhea(talk) 15:13, August 19, 2013 (UTC)
- Changed, could you check it now? TK-999 (Talk) 15:21, August 19, 2013 (UTC)
- And repositioned File:MainPageIssue2.png's slider. TK-999 (Talk) 15:26, August 19, 2013 (UTC)
It's not just the slider. The columns are 50% by 50% rather than 67/33:
This is how it should look:
(though the second image there doesn't have the Sci-Fi Alliance banner, which should obviously still be there) - Brandon Rhea(talk) 15:27, August 19, 2013 (UTC)
- That's odd, it's 67%/30.5% for me. Could you do a cache purge? TK-999 (Talk) 15:31, August 19, 2013 (UTC)
- I've already done that, to no effect. The page works fine in Firefox, but not Chrome. I'll try again later. - Brandon Rhea(talk) 15:34, August 19, 2013 (UTC)