Wikipedia:WikiProject Usability/Reducing interface complexity
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Project goals
The goals of this project are to identify software changes that can reduce the complexity of Wikipedia's interface, and to advocate for such changes on behalf of inexperienced and future editors.
Why this project is needed
- Inexperienced editors typically aren't aware of what is possible with Wikipedia, or where to discuss changes, or already-existing discussions
- Potential editors - including those who may have started to edit a page, become discouraged, and left, are totally unrepresented at Wikipedia
- Experienced editors often don't realize the amount of implicit knowledge that they've learned about Wikipedia, and thus underestimate how difficult it can be for others to learn how Wikipedia works
Software changes of interest to the project
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Hbfv
Other changes
- Automated citations: a "one-click" browser option that automatically creates a citation for pasting into a Wikipedia article. The model is what is now possible when searching Google Scholar - a single click creates a full cite that can be copied directly into an article. Having such a tool would be huge step toward better quality - it would be as easy to add a full cite as to add just a URL.
- Status: Parts of such a browser extension already exist: WPCITE grabs a limited amount of information; User:DumZiBoT is a bot that makes a "best guess" for a page title, given a naked URL enclosed by "ref" tags. But the developer of the bot has said that titles are quite non-standard, so the bot can only make a best guess.
- Comments:
- Content providers, such as the New York Times and Washington Post, would benefit from standard (universal) meta-tags for article title, author, date, etc., because this would make it easier for Wikipedia to send readers to their pages. Wikipedia obviously would benefit from such standardization.
- It's not clear that anyone other than an official representative of the Wikimedia Foundation would get the attention of content providers, let alone be able to "bless" a standard set of metatags that those providers should use.
- Next steps:
- Perhaps a couple of editors could put together a table showing what metatags are now used by a few of the main sources cited in Wikipedia: say, news.bbc.co.uk and www.bbc.co.uk, www.nytimes.com, www.guardian.co.uk, www.pbs.org, www.washingtonpost.com, www.cnn.com, and www.cbc.ca, for article title, author, article date, and publisher, to get an idea of the way the world is now?