Topic on Talk:Talk pages project/New topic/Flow

Ways to make "starting new discussions" easier

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Summary last edited by Whatamidoing (WMF) 16:33, 13 June 2023 10 months ago

You can see how this research is being applied to this project by reading this task: task T249784

PPelberg (WMF) (talkcontribs)

What pages/wikis are you aware of that have implemented a unique way of starting a new discussion?

We have listed some examples of we are aware of below.

Additional context

Knowing what alternative solutions individuals and wikis have already implemented to make it easier for people to start new discussions will help us:

A) More deeply understand the issues people see with the existing start a new discussion experience and

B) Identify solutions we ought to consider incorporating into the new experience we are starting to design.

PPelberg (WMF) (talkcontribs)

The "unique ways of starting a new discussion" we are currently aware of:

  1. On the French Wikipedia's wikitext talk pages, there is an Ajouter un sujet link at the bottom of each talk page.
  2. On English Wikipedia's Teahouse, there is a large Ask a question button at the top of the page.
  3. The English WIkipedia's {{Talk header}} template includes a link that states: Click here to start a new topic.
  4. Some editors, such as this one at cswiki, have put buttons at the top of their user talk pages.
  5. On the French Wikipedia's "Request to administrators" page, they have a button at the top of the talk page that reads Make a new request.
Whatamidoing (WMF) (talkcontribs)

There's also the [Edit source | Add section] gadget (e.g., at dewiki and Meta-Wiki).

Pelagic (talkcontribs)

Also the full-width blue button “Add discussion” in Minerva. And the small blue “+” button at top-right of user talk pages in iOS Wikipedia app. (Yes, I know the scope of this project is desktop Vector, but we can still take inspiration from elsewhere, no?)

Pelagic (talkcontribs)

Oh, I see that phab:249784 is closed, should we close this thread also?

phab:T247485 only tested pages with the gold template, but not any of the ones with big buttons, so it didn't come close to the range of 249784.

Looking at the dates, those two ran in parallel. Is there a plan to do a third round of user testing on some more page types described in 249784?

Pelagic (talkcontribs)

French talk pages have a small link «Ajouter en sujet», that allows you to add section from the bottom of the page without scrolling back to top.