Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Usability/Main Page/Draft/Talk archive for Draft 3

message: Things I just edited.. for those of you working on this project.
* Some boxes had padding, others did not.  The ones without padding (text hit the borders, or got close) I added 8px padding.  Looks pretty uniform.
* Added a box around the sister projects.. + #ffffff background.
* Made languages box have a #ffffff background.  The rest of the page did and the slight aquamarine white color made the rest of the page look misplaced.  Uniform white looks very nice.
* I did not change the border color of the sister project box.. it is the same as the language box.  It should probably be changed, but I did not know what to.  Also, the background colors of the sister and language boxes could certainly be changed.. I more or less defaulted them to white so I didn't mess with the page's styling..
* The source of the FPC template cannot be viewed or I would make one that came sans formatting.  If anyone is an administrator and would like to send me the wiki source code, I can make one that will work with the page..
If you need any more help or wish to reprimand me for making stupid edits, feel free to let me know.  I'm good with HTML and I can help wherever. drumguy8800 - speak? 17:58, 5 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: No reprimands. You were bold: that's good!  Though one of the biggest critiques in feedback from users is that there is too much white space -- they like the gaps between the boxes small.  Other than the column of white down the middle, everything else you did appears to be right on the mark!  The page looks a lot crisper than it did.  Thanks!  As for the colors for the sisters and langs, we should research the standard first, and embellish it a little. Go for it! 19:49, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

text: You can generally view the sourcecode of protected pages, so I'm not sure why you were having trouble there. Also, why do we need Template:FPC?  I'm not sure why you mentioned this template.  Go for it! 19:49, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

text: If you carefully trace the transclusions back to the original source, you'll find that they are subpages, one for each day of the year.  Unfortunately, the formmatting is in every single one of them.  According to Wikipedia:Picture of the day: "The picture of the day is an image which is dynamically updated each day with an image from Wikipedia:Featured pictures."  The problem I keep running into is that the centralized source calls pictures from those 365 subpages, each with the border formatting in them.  If I'm mistaken, or have missed something, please point it out to me. 
I've posted the template source below in a reply to another user.  Go for it! 19:49, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

text: We'll have to fix this in a future redesign.  The Portals for Cricket and Philosophy solve this problem, so I'm told.  Go for it! 19:49, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

text: Well that's difficult to answer.  Yes there is, but there will always be a few constraints.  Your main constraint in this instance is that one column will *always* have to be longer than the other.  Pending that this is okay, I've set up an example.. .  This example works only with two columns.. if three or more are required, it gets, unfortunately, trickier.  How this one example works is that in the source, you must input the second column's data first.  It has the "float" attribute set to "right", so that it will always sit up against the right edge of the master div.  Its "position" attribute is set to "absolute" so that it will not interfere with the other column's placement.  Lastly, you declare "bottom: 0px; right: 0px;" so that it rides 0px from the right hand side of the div and 0px from the bottom, or, in other words, flush against the bottom-right corner.  The first column (the one that always must be longer is set to "position: relative;" so that the master div will fit to that height and allow both columns to display fully.  You do not set it to "bottom: 0px; left: 0px;" because both would be redundant since objects flow LtoR and the first column is as long as its going to get.. I sincerely hope you do not want to make the left column longer (or let them both be of dynamic lengths) because the programming got too hairy for me and I gave up for now.. but if its needed, I can keep looking.. I'm sure there's a solution.  If you require 3 or more columns, tell me how many, and I can at least even try with that.  Unfortunately you cannot dynamically call another attribute's height with document.getElementById('id').style.height or programming would be a lot easier.  Maybe they'll include an attribute that makes this easier in the next version of CSS. drumguy8800 - speak? 06:08, 6 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Edits 

message: I highly suggest you switch  with .  The proportions of  so much better fit the space on the Main page.  I tried this switch, in preview, with the Draft, and it looks so much better.  Secondly, (not the best solution) but it just happened to make the bottom of the boxes line up nearly perfectly in my browser.  Though, I tried resizing my browser to see what would happen.  I discovered another major problem with the design (using ).  The left-column  boxes (Today's featured article, DYK) resized accordingly with my browser window.  The right-column (Featured picture, and ITN), didn't resize accordingly.  This is because of how  is set-up.  It would instead need to move the text below the pic, when the browser is resized.  Tom had implemented something like this in the earlier draft, with the right-hand browse bar. —--Aude (talk | contribs) 18:24, 5 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  The talk page link you provided is very helpful, giving some more insight on how they do the POTD.  I'm sure we can setup some script/template like they mention, for the POTD to fit in the main page.  If the consensus likes the new design, at that point, we can get Solipsist to provide further guidance.  This user seems to be the one handling the POTD duties most days. —--Aude (talk | contribs) 14:12, 6 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Pic of the day

message: I suggest putting in the news above pic of the day. I use the former more often and I'm sure most people do too. If they want to see the other ones they can scroll down, however, news should be right there. Anyone else agree? —Ilyanep (Talk) 21:20, 5 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes.  ITN should be above the POTD.  mdf 00:23, 6 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  ITN vs. POTD 

message: No linkage at all to help newcomers navigate to these newcomer friendly places?  --hydnjo talk 21:34, 5 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: [[WP:RD]] and [[WP:HD]]

message: I think that the giant hole in the right side of the page needs to be taken out. What I would do is:
#Put "Do you know" in the blank spot.
#Put "On this day" where do you know is.
#Extend the FAC description so that do you know and on this day end at the same spot.
#Under that is where the "Wikipedia in other languages" section should start.
Tell me what you think. RENTASTRAWBERRY FOR LET? röck 23:29, 5 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Rentastrawberry's Idea

message: Eugh! :) How about a dark skin? —Ilyanep (Talk) 04:51, 6 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Um, I guess I'm in the minority, but I LIKE the pastels. Maybe make the coloration available as a skin option? Her Pegship 19:02, 6 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Pastel Colored borders? 

message: The current English home page and the current proposition at User:Kmf164/Main_page_draft are both rather drab when compared to other languages... for example, the Italian homepage looks very nice.  Their buttons at the top of all pages are rounded, too.  I don't know why its necessary that the English page be quite so battleship gray and blah..?  I personally like the proposed pastel colors.  drumguy8800 - speak? 06:14, 6 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Colorations 

message: Wow, I really like the Italian version too. Those particular icons are bright, smooth, but not large and obtrusive. If we want to change the "battleship-gray bureaucratic" look on the front page, but still keep it simple and dignified, maybe icons are the way to go. Her Pegship 16:03, 7 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  The Italian job