Talk:Reading/Web/Desktop Improvements

Limit the screen width
I think the worst one can do is limit the screen width... I's far less relaxed for reading and a waste of screen space. Switched back to the previous version. 213.219.163.24 23:41, 21 March 2023 (UTC)
 * Hello! I'd like to invite you to read this page: Reading/Web/Desktop Improvements/Features/Limiting content width. There we've documented our arguments for this change. If you prefer the full width, you may use the button in the bottom right corner of the screen, too. I hope this solves the issue! SGrabarczuk (WMF) (talk) 17:57, 30 March 2023 (UTC)
 * I have a somewhat related question. I see that there is a toggle on the MediWiki site in the bottom right corner to adjust width, which is great... but I don't see it on my own install using Vector 2022 (MediaWiki version 1.39.3). Is there something I'm missing in order to make that visible? I don't have the "Enable limited width mode" option in user preferences either. Thanks in advance for any insight you can offer. Adoxtater (talk) 02:29, 27 April 2023 (UTC)
 * My install of MediaWiki also does not have the full width toggle button. Fanra (talk) 10:39, 25 May 2023 (UTC)
 * If you're not seeing the limited-width toggle, it might be because the browser window is too small. Currently, per T326887 the limited width toggle is only available when the browser window is bigger than 1400px wide. JDrewniak (WMF) (talk) 17:57, 26 May 2023 (UTC)
 * I have dual monitor and stretched the window to run the full width of both and still no toggle button. However, on the mediawiki site it does show up even on a single monitor. Unless, of course, they're running some other code that makes it happen I guess. Adoxtater (talk) 22:21, 30 May 2023 (UTC)
 * I have designed an alternative toggle button that I feel better represents the functionality... and emailed it to answers@wikimedia.org. Is there a better way to share it?? 68.83.135.144 18:24, 25 May 2023 (UTC)
 * I have designed an alternative toggle button that I feel better represents the functionality... and emailed it to answers@wikimedia.org. Is there a better way to share it??
 * Disallowing me to upload... AlanGochin (talk) 18:31, 25 May 2023 (UTC)
 * I'd like to say that even after reading those pages and the research about page-width, from my perspective it's a bad default setting because it works against the things that page says it's being implemented to improve.
 * In my experience it's made wiki in general less readable because the article content is now  less than 50%  of my ultrawide screen (2560px horizontal resolution, default text width ends up at ~1025px) which creates the effect of a newspaper with only one, often extremely long column, hurting readability because you have to jump lines and scroll so much more often which at least for me completely breaks the flow the article had. In fact, I'd describe it as closer to an old school scroll than a newspaper. :/ 203.12.8.36 06:43, 8 July 2023 (UTC)
 * Being a long-time user of Wikipedia I have to say the old look is more superior than the new one. Not only is it wider it is also more simple. Having the contents on the left side of the screen in the new look isn't that helpful because the first thing people see in an article is the introduction. Volcanoguy (talk) 00:09, 21 July 2023 (UTC)

Some opposes and supports with same argument

 * Moved at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/Rollback_of_Vector_2022#Some_opposes_and_supports_with_same_argument

Interwiki links dependancy from ULS extension.
Hi! I am quite disappointed that interwiki links has dependancy from ULS extension from MW 1.39. ULS extension works not so properly at my wiki farm, that's why I never used it, and basically I don't need it. And it is quite strange that only Vector-2022 skin has this dependancy as other skins displays interwiki language links. Can you explain why developers has done that? Fokebox (talk) 08:21, 18 April 2023 (UTC)


 * Hey @Fokebox. You'll find information about that on the page about the feature. Is this helpful? I understand that there may be some difference between the Wikimedia wikis and third-party wikis. SGrabarczuk (WMF) (talk) 13:46, 18 April 2023 (UTC)
 * Well, let me explain what issues I experience. I begin from the first one:
 * I have different localisations of my wiki farm that has common shared database and common files of mediawiki. All localisations made just like in wikipedia: ru.mywikifarm.org - Russian, en.mywikifarm.org - English, es.mywikifarm.org - Spanish etc. The $wgLanguageCode is determined for every localisation, i.e for English it is $wgLanguageCode = "en";, for $wgLanguageCode = "ru"; is for Russian etc. The issue is that the language of all website is correct for logged in user, but when it is a guest (non logged-in user) all localisations are in Russian, i.e. en.mywikifarm.org - is in Russian, es.mywikifarm.org - is in Russian etc. When I switch off ULS extension then all works fine for logged in user and for guests (non logged-in users). And I don't know how to solve this issue.
 * Fokebox (talk) 19:25, 18 April 2023 (UTC)
 * I use MW 1.39.3 at my wiki family. I have interwiki links and don't need ULS so far. But interwiki links do not work without the extension at Vector-2022. How can I disable ULS but have my interwiki links? Fokebox (talk) 13:39, 17 May 2023 (UTC)
 * I am writing this message to remove dependancy of ULS with Interwiki links. All other skins do not have it. I don't need ULS at my website as it works not properly at my wiki farm. Fokebox (talk) 14:50, 29 May 2023 (UTC)
 * The issue is resolved with MW 1.40.0. Fokebox (talk) 08:47, 4 July 2023 (UTC)


 * The second issue is following: When ULS extension is on! I do see the interwiki box showing the number of languages at my Vector-2022 skin, but when I click the box - sometimes the links are shown, and sometimes the box is empty, in spite of that HTML code is fine - I see at HTML this links and text. But it works all strange, sometimes there are links and sometimes there aren't any. And it is difficult to say why it happening and how to debug this.
 * My wiki farm website:
 * MediaWiki 1.39.3
 * PHP 8.0.28 (cgi-fcgi)
 * MySQL 5.7.34
 * Fokebox (talk) 19:45, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Page zone separation trial (Zebra9)
Are comments about the ongoing trial being collated anywhere? Personally I am finding the grey background separation between zones to be a backward step from the "cleanliness" of V22. AllyD (talk) 19:38, 2 June 2023 (UTC)


 * Same for me. MikeMatyMatta (talk) 11:43, 6 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Hello @AllyD and @MikeMatyMatta. Thanks for being interested in the A/B test.
 * As we announced before the launch of the A/B test, the goal for this is to measure the following: pageviews, opt-out rates, edit rate, Table of Contents usage, scrolling, and page tools usage. After the test, we'll analyze the data and decide if Zebra #9 would become the default look.
 * That being said, if you have feedback, we'll be happy to read it! SGrabarczuk (WMF) (talk) 13:10, 19 June 2023 (UTC)

Notifications missing from sticky nav
The sticky navigation has all the important links available except one: notifications. This means that when I am working through my notifications, I always have to scroll back to the top to go to the next one. This should be changed. Discostu (talk) 13:45, 8 June 2023 (UTC)
 * The Vector 2022 bug fixing that was happening at a pretty quick rate for a few weeks after the initial deployment has slowed to a crawl, as often happens with shiny new beta deployments (see also the Visual Editor, still in beta after many years). See for an example of a request related to the sticky header. To fix it for yourself, if you are willing to modify your CSS files, see https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/User:Quiddity/Vector-2022-condensed.css for code that can make the default page header sticky so that you do not have to deal with the inexplicable differences between the top-of-page header and the sticky header. Jonesey95 (talk) 00:38, 9 June 2023 (UTC)
 * @Jonesey95, you've been watching the development of the project for a long time. You may remember that the initial deployment took place in 2020 and it happened on several wikis, like French or Hebrew Wikipedia. When we deployed on English Wikipedia earlier this year, we were close to the end of the project.
 * @Discostu, thanks for raising this issue. I admit, I'd prefer the sticky header with the notifications, too. However, according to our engineers, this is a difficult task, and that's why we haven't done it yet. I also recommend taking a look at the discussion in the relevant Phabricator task where you'll find detailed arguments against it. SGrabarczuk (WMF) (talk) 23:08, 21 June 2023 (UTC)
 * With all respect, it was not that difficult for me to get it working for my account. I have it displaying on every page, in every namespace, right now on en.WP. It works great. The necessary CSS is linked above. The fundamental problem is that the top-of-page header is different from the sticky header, which is very confusing from a UX perspective. Making the sticky header the only header fixes that UX design problem. Jonesey95 (talk) 01:47, 22 June 2023 (UTC)

On Main Page, the interwiki links are... at the bottom?!? Why?
One of the most disruptive changes in the new interface, is that the interwiki links were moved, from the lower left menu, to the top-right corner of the page. So disruptive that it was necessary to put a warning message in the old place, telling people were to find them. This is already a bad design, and frustrating enough (a good UI shouldn't need to tell people where to look). But today I found out that these new design is not even consistent in the different pages. When moving through different projects and comparing their respective main pages, I stumbled on some projects that use the new interface, and to my surprise I couldn't find the interwiki links in neither the old place nor the new! And after much frustration, eventually I found them... at the bottom of the main page. Why this choice? It was already a bad decision to move them, but at the very least they should always be in one place, so people always know where to find them and don't have to search for them every time. Candalua (talk) 12:55, 3 July 2023 (UTC)


 * Ciao @Candalua! Grazie per il commento, mi permetto di risponderti in italiano. Trovi il motivo per cui il pulsante delle lingue è stato spostato in questa sezione delle FAQ, ti farà piacere sapere che si puo' facimente mettere in cima alla Pagina principale con il consenso della comunità, con o senza un messaggio di benvenuto. :) Resto a disposizione, Patafisik (WMF) (talk) 11:28, 5 July 2023 (UTC)

Poor mobile support under 500px (MW1.39)
The new vector layout has no user-tools menu (eg login), no notification alerts (and an overly wide search toggle) in the header - unless you know to scroll off the right to find them. This is not exactly the mobile improvement expected, and possibly going to discourage signup from Anons. This happens only when responsive is on in user preferences (which if off affects other skins too).

The issue seems to not be on en WP or mediawiki (which are 1.41) - whats's the fix for this?

Alternatively is there CSS to shuffle them left? (I don't see any in use in MW or WP). I didnt see anything on phabricator.

Issue appears to be related to  in Vector skin in core |resources/common/variables.less

Defines the minimum viewport width, at which point the layout will not get any smaller and will start horizontal scrolling instead.

@min-width-supported: unit( 500px Amousey (talk) 01:42, 4 July 2023 (UTC)

Tewiki:User menu drop down
This is about Tewiki. User menu drop down has the following issues: Note: The behaviour mentioned at point #1 above, is not noticed in enwiki. The above problem is exact repetition of an earlier issue that I reported here on these pages. __ Chaduvari (talk) 01:49, 7 July 2023 (UTC)
 * 1) When page is not scrolled, when the mouse hovers on Contributions menu item, a sub-menu list appears with three links - contribs, translations, uploaded media. When I move the mouse to click any of these three sub-menus, this sub-menu list disappears. It is impossible to click these three sub-menus. When I move the mouse around the tool tip, then, the sub-menu list does not disappear.
 * 2) In the sticky drop down, the sub-menu is not shown at all.


 * Thank you @Chaduvari for reporting those issues. Traked on Phabricator here, here and here. Patafisik (WMF) (talk) 15:52, 15 July 2023 (UTC)

Expanding and hiding of dropdown menus implies no change in their indicator symbols
Hi, at the top menu of Wikipedia there exists dropdown menus named "tools" and "languages" and "TW". These menus are by default at the state of "hidden" and have the symbol "˅". But after clicking on these words, the dropdown menus' state changes to "expanded". The problem is that their indicator symbol should change to "˄", but this scenario is not applied, and the symbol does not change and remains "˅". This changing of symbol to "˄" is necessary to indicate the dropdown menu's state is "expanded" and a click on it causes a "hide" action. This scenario is nearly always applied in MS Windows's dropdown menus. Hooman Mallahzadeh (talk) 11:51, 10 July 2023 (UTC)


 * The has this visual shortcoming as one of several issues under discussion. DavidBrooks (talk) 17:25, 18 July 2023 (UTC)

please add dark mode!!
dark mode should be on wikipedia by now. every or most site on the internet has it. why doesn't the wiki have it too? Crenshire 23:36, 18 July 2023 (UTC)


 * Hello @Crenshire, thanks for your question. We will be building dark mode soon. Subscribe Newsletter:Web team's projects to get updates about that :) SGrabarczuk (WMF) (talk) 12:32, 19 July 2023 (UTC)
 * I subscribed. Does the newsletter send me news in the alerts or notices page? Crenshire (talk) 21:47, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

why is the search field hidden
In the old desktop version the search field was always visible and you could tab into it. Now you have to click the icon. Why do this? Searching for something is the main use for an encyclopedia. Stuartbrussell (talk) 07:01, 19 July 2023 (UTC)


 * Nevermind, it looks like somehow my browser went to the mobile version where you have to tap the search icon. Not sure how that happened... Stuartbrussell (talk) 07:04, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

Sidebar Main Menu
The sidebar main menu should be the same color as the background. Crenshire (talk) 21:47, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

What was the process for adding a sticky navbar?
I see some engagement metrics were used in the Features page, but I believe engagement metrics are the root of all evil on the web. The kinds of questions that matter are "did the user leave the page having learned something?," "if the user was looking for something specific, did they find it? How quickly?", and "did the user retain the information?"

The primary purpose of opening a page on wikipedia is to read the content in the page. A sticky navbar uses important vertical space on my screen that I want to use to read content to try and get me to do some other things.

Where can I learn more about how this decision was made, and who was involved? Is this decision reversible? 107.190.47.147 13:52, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

Interwiki on special pages
Hi! On Polish Wikipedia we used to have interwiki links on Special:Watchlist so as to allow users to switch to their watchlists in foreign language projects in a usual way, like on every other wiki page (the links are defined here). In Vector 2022 however, the language switcher displays just a language icon in the header and nothing happens after clicking it. Is it intentional to disable language switcher in such a case or is it just a bug? Msz2001 (talk) 15:49, 28 July 2023 (UTC)