Talk:Account creation user experience

Previous ideas or stuff for the future

 * 1) Remove clutter of MediaWiki messages MediaWiki:Fancycaptcha and MediaWiki:email-help(-others) messages (ala ) and include mention of username policy
 * 2) Show asterisks next to required fields instead of optional
 * 3) Auto-focus the first field in the registration process
 * 4) Move CAPTCHA field below account creation fields
 * 5) Implement naming and password guidelines as tooltips on Field Names (or beside fields)
 * 6) Language tweaks with a very short word budget (list currently in Google Docs, needs to be wikified) Coordinate with Mobile team, as they will also be using tiny word budgets.
 * 7) Add benefits of signing up in place of removed User Policy
 * 8) Require email address to create an account, in the interests of increasing the "quality" of registrations over quantity

Additional variants

 * 1) Replace CAPTCHA with a honeypot. See also: https://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=5309
 * 2) Utilize password recovery icon
 * 3) Login/signup detatched from Special page, probably via a test of mw:Extension:SignupAPI.
 * 4) Integrate create and login on the same page (Prerequisite is the above. This is not the design, but illustrates the idea: )
 * 5) Log in without leaving the page you're on - utilize modal window (Requires work on previous two tasks. Similar to this design.)
 * 6) Log In / Create Account order on every page
 * 7) Request password only once
 * 8) Allow for password unmask

Post account creation tests

 * 1) Adjust landing page (MediaWiki:Welcomecreation). Test at least two variants of text on that page aimed at driving certain actions, as opposed to simply dumping documentation on the lap of a new Wikipedian. This will be the next experiment once the registration process is sufficiently improved.
 * 2) Return user to the page they came from instead of taking them to a welcome landing page
 * 3) Add a 'return to previous page' link on the welcome landing page to take the user back to the page where they clicked the login button
 * 4) Ask people to do things upon completion (a whole world of microtasks available)


 * Form Features

The following is a laundry list of parameters of the account creation UI that can be modified:


 * message content.
 * captcha
 * form field dimensions
 * Honeypot vs CAPTCHA
 * email address field
 * form field autofocus
 * password unmask is availability
 * password is only entered once vs twice


 * Events on form completion (future iterations):
 * previous page link appear
 * Microtask suggestions


 * Other experiments where we haven't yet defined data needed (future iterations):
 * Login/signup detatched from Special page, probably via a test of mw:Extension:SignupAPI.
 * Integrate create and login on the same page (Prerequisite is the above. This is not the design, but illustrates the idea: [2])
 * Log in without leaving the page you're on - utilize modal window (Requires work on previous two tasks. Similar to this design.)

Data anomalies on account creation page
In the following cases, registered, logged in editors may unintentionally trigger an event on the account creation page:


 * Users bucketed as part of the Account Creation Improvement Project (ACIP), who are taken through multiple signup screens
 * Users who are browsing Wikipedia in multiple tabs, log in through one, and then attempt to log in through another (may be clicking "Create an account" to log in, possibly because the login/create account links used to be unified and were only recently split)
 * Users entering an invalid password in the signup form