Talk:The Sims Wiki

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This is an old revision of this page, as edited by imported>A morris at 05:39, 3 January 2011 (→‎Redesign input). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.
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Talk:The Sims Wiki
Use this page to discuss design and content changes to the Main Page. For general wiki discussion, please visit the Community Portal or the Forum:Doo Peas Corporate Tower.

Redesign of the Main Page

I don't want to stir the pot too much, but I think maybe we should start discussing the idea of redesigning the Main Page. There's a couple reasons for this:

  1. - It's old; see this version of the main page from 17 months ago; notice any similarities? Sure, this is by no means the primary reason why something should change, but it is nice to get a new look every once in a while.
  2. - The New skin: I probably sound like a broken record by now, but I can't bring it up enough - our main page needs to serve as the lobby of the wiki and must offer ample navigation opportunities. From our lobby, you should be able to reach your end destination relatively quickly. Important links to content, community, development, and administrative pages and tools should be available on the main page, which should largely serve as a supplement to the drop-down menus.
  3. - Adjustment of priorities: We obviously don't want to make the main page too large, so a redesign would obviously necessitate the addition of some material and the removal of some other material. Are there items on the mainpage which could be replaced with other items; probably.

Like I said, I don't want to cause too much drama with this, but it may be something we should look at sooner or later. To get a good feel for what I mean when I say I want a change, take a good look at some other wikis (specifically the better-known ones) and see how they handle their main pages; our wiki has an entirely different feel from most wikis, I've noticed. - LostInRiverview talk · blog 06:29, November 5, 2010 (UTC)

I agree, the main page needs a redesign. I was looking at random wikis and really liked DCAU Wiki ([1]). Nice, clean layout, well chosen categories for the main menu. If I have time, I will make a prototype based on it.
Regarding the links to all the games: When I removed them back in Sep '09 it was because of this article which states, "Google recommends no more than 100 links from your main page." (At this time there are 139 links.) Although the newsletter was written before the new skin, I still recommend we follow that guideline. --a_morris (talk) 22:50, December 15, 2010 (UTC)
Based on the recent revisions to the mainpage, I'd say that guideline has been blown out of the water (referring to the 'The Sims Series' section with links to all the games). I don't mean to throw too much on your plate, but I don't trust myself to try and improve it, as I really don't know much about coding or making things look good. I'd be more comfortable working on the navigation portion (which I have been doing), but that's beside the point. I like the layout for that Wiki's mainpage quite a bit as well. -- LostInRiverview talk · blog 00:31, December 16, 2010 (UTC)
Contents being pushed down. Too wide with advertising

I've narrowed {{Contents}} so it doesn't get pushed down by the advertising. --a_morris (talk) 01:41, December 19, 2010 (UTC)

The Sims Series

Is there a way to collapse The Sims Series box? I've tried time and time again, but I never found a way that worked. —Random Ranaun (Talk to me!) 13:45, December 17, 2010 (UTC)

I've noticed that the collapse javascript isn't working at all any more. --a_morris (talk) 01:23, December 19, 2010 (UTC)
What do you think is causing it? —Random Ranaun (Talk to me!) 05:28, December 19, 2010 (UTC)
Actually, a lot of things aren't working anymore. {{Countdown}} doesn't work because the script associated with it has stopped working as well. I can't remember the other stuff off the top of my head, but it's sort of annoying, to say the least. - LostInRiverview talk · blog 08:33, January 2, 2011 (UTC)
It seems that all the javascript problems, including issues with the countdown and collapsible navboxes, have been resolved! -- LostInRiverview talk · blog 01:49, January 3, 2011 (UTC)

Redesign input

This section is for TSW reader input on the idea of changing the main page. Feel free to provide any suggestions, or highlight any issues you see with the current main page. - LostInRiverview talk · blog 23:08, December 19, 2010 (UTC)

I know it looks horrible, but heres my idea:

  1. The boxes that show a picture and links to pages (wikibuttons), like Sims, The Sims Series, etc.
  2. The entire welcome text, The Sims database that anyone can edit! A collaborative encyclopedia for everything related to The Sims series. There are 6,557 articles and growing since this wiki was founded in February 2005. The wiki format allows anyone to create or edit any article, so we can all work together to create a comprehensive database for The Sims series.........
  3. A small box that links to our other site accounts, like youtube, Facebook, etc.
  4. Featured Media
  5. Battles
  6. Featured Poll
  7. The community bar, which should be re-designed.
  8. Featured editor
  9. Featured contest
  10. Featured Article

BobNewbie talk • blog 08:10, December 20, 2010 (UTC)

What's in box 11? Keep in mind too that a space needs to be reserved for advertisements. -- LostInRiverview talk · blog 16:30, December 20, 2010 (UTC)
I don't really know what were going to use box 11 for. That could possibly be A: The box for advertisements or B: A "news" box. BobNewbie talk • blog 16:55, December 20, 2010 (UTC)
I say you need a place for the "Create A New Article" input box I put on the bottom of the page. It's just plain annoying making a new article without it. Pin Collector talk • blog
There's an 'Add Page' link at the very top of the main page, immediately to the right of the wiki page count, and immediately to the left of the link to this talk page. -- LostInRiverview talk · blog 03:28, December 29, 2010 (UTC)

"So should we remove the one at the bottom? --BobNewbie talk • blog 07:02, December 29, 2010 (UTC)

I'd like to direct everyone's attention to the Spanish-language 'Simspedia' (our sister wiki); specifically their main page - es:Portada and the 'slideshow thing' that they have... I think it would be really cool for our new mainpage to have something like that, cycling through highlighted articles for upcoming games, community events, etc. Thoughts on that? -- LostInRiverview talk · blog 10:06, December 30, 2010 (UTC)

I couldn't get it to work --a_morris (talk) 04:28, January 1, 2011 (UTC)

I tried it on my test page to no avail. From what I gather at central wikia's forum, it's activated through special:contact, but I haven't gotten around to activating it yet, since I didn't want to have it activated only to have us not use it. But for us to get a good idea of what it could be used for, I suppose there's no avoiding it, is there? I'll make the contact and put a sample gallery here so we can all see it (in English)! -- LostInRiverview talk · blog 07:40, January 2, 2011 (UTC)

One design idea: User:A morris/mainpage-left & User:A morris/mainpage-right --a_morris (talk) 04:28, January 1, 2011 (UTC)

So mainpage-left would be the 'main' column, correct? - LostInRiverview talk · blog 08:34, January 2, 2011 (UTC)
Yup. Normal pages are too narrow to show the columns side-by-side. --a_morris (talk) 05:39, January 3, 2011 (UTC)
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