Please reply here to discuss the "In-context lessons (2)" idea.
Topic on Talk:Growth/Discussing potential Growth ideas/2023
Can we get data about existing boxes on the Visual Editor ?
See Talk:In-context help and onboarding for a wide-ranging discussion of in-context help. I remain firmly convinced that pop-up boxes (summoned by the user, say by clicking on an circled "i" [information] icon next to a menu choice is the best way to go, here (that, of course, doesn't have to be the only way), with the pop-up box having links that lead the user - if he/she wants to follow them - to more detailed help pages.
As someone who has worked extensively on the VisualEditor user guide, I'd be happy to help create a couple of "model" pop-ups, which might include modifying the existing dialogs that are already in VE (these were added by a programmer, without any community input, so the language is not optimal for beginners; more importantly, they lack links).
This is a really important solution, and I think developing these kinds of "hands off" lessons will be much more scalable for small wikis, than trying to feed more folks into conversation spaces.
For what it's worth, the project for which I am currently requesting funding may be of significant help here. The in-context help could refer users to the videos and other materials that I am planning to create and curate. Although my first audience will be English Wikipedia, I am strongly hoping for there to be translations of the video subtitles. I could translate some of the subtitles myself into Spanish. I would welcome collaboration with translators and the WMF Growth Team to maximize the impact of this project.
I am definitely in favour of this. I particulary agree with John Broughton's suggestion on clicking on the i-icon in a menu choice to create a pop-up. It would be nice if the pop-up could be postioned (or moveable by the user) so the user can see both the pop-up and whatever they are working on at the same time, rather than having to close the pop-up forcing you to remember what it told you to do. I think short pop-up help with a link to a more fullsome help is a good balance.
It sound good, but we should not forget that also some new users not favor (visual editing) and like to use (source editing) -I know many new users when I directing them to the source editing, they like it more than the visual one-.
Probably we can make videos like (How to write an article?, How to edit Wikipedia?, How to put a picture in article?) and share it under CC in youtube channel (and/or in page for new editors in Wikipedia, "page only include videos"), and we can make small/medium/long videos for every thing in wikipedia editing even "how to make word bold in wikipedia?", and if we use simple generic titles for this videos it'll help very much.
I talked from my experience in creating videos about new tools in arwiki. Almost for every new tool in arwiki, we make documentation page contains words and video (Usually one me make it) how to use this tool. For example, Rater tool page in arwiki.
As we now, that all new editors if they faced any problem or can't do anything, they try to search about it via search engines and if they found video that help them, they will open it immediately.
The most important thing that who to select attractive titles and use the keywords.
If we take a look here (for example), we'll found many videos with more than 100K views, or here videos with more than 50K about who to delete Wikipedia article, or [how to add photo on wikipedia article here] videos with more than 50K about about how to add photos on Wikipeda articles.
The new worlds like to see not to read, and to learn by videos is very popular now.
Thanks for the comments, User:علاء. I hope to offer help for the Wikitext 2017 editor in my video project. I would appreciate your comments on Meta:Grants:Project/Rapid/Pine/Continuation_of_educational_video_and_website_project, if you have the time to provide any on the talk page. Thank you very much.
Not a bad idea, imho as long as the amount of pop-ups is limited to a good number and frequency.
Thank you all for weighing in on this "In-context lessons" idea. Our team discussed all the feedback, and I've summarized it here. We're now figuring out whether to pursue this idea, and we'll be back to discuss more if we decide to work on it (please sign up for our newsletter to get updates on our plans).
One big open question with this idea is how to anticipate what a new editor needs to know, and present them that information. In other words, having content that explains citations is helpful once the new editor has clicked "Cite". But what about those new editors who need to do a citation, but don't even know that yet, and therefore won't be clicking "Cite"? How can the software know when it's time to tell them about citations? I'm interested in hearing everyone's opinions on this.
@John Broughton, thank you for the offer to help with content. We'll definitely take you up on that once our team gets to that point. In your experience, do you find that your Visual Editor guide needs to explain the technology more (e.g. how to do a citation), or the concepts more (e.g. when is it important to have citations)?
@علاء, have you found it challenging to keep videos up-to-date as the technology changes? I know that it can take a long time to make a video, and also could be difficult to keep track of what version of the software a video is showing.
Tooltips. There can never be too many tooltips. Its popup info is initiated by the user, and so it is not intrusive.
Pushing citations is an intimidating area for new users. Just suggesting they leave a URL is enough for now. Plus a popup link: "For further info on references".