Front End/Accessibility dev

Getting Started with Skins[edit]

Resources[edit]

Notes on Skins[edit]

At first look it seems conceptually similar to the LJ s2 system, but php.

What do the most successful skins (monobook and vector) have in common? What do they lack? Check out skins in the wild Lens

Okay so first write the FEATURES, then the LAYOUT, then the LOOKS. Click looks?

Random idea: say, nominate 5-10 options for your "utility belt" then have it filled with your "most clicked" links and options. Choose to freeze some options in the belt. Toss everything else into a (bat) cave.

Taxonomy Notes[edit]

Outline taxonomy. Daniel Friesen highlights the elements: body, title hierarchy, notifications, search, personal tools, actions, toolbox, language links, footer.

Supertypes:

Object: ENTRY, USER
Category: hierarchy and organisation
Actions: buttons, making changes

ZONE: SEARCH/BROWSE/EXPLORE

Search/browse: search box, category navigation, wikilinks
Recent changes etc [[1]] These are all procedural?

ZONE: CONTENT

Read Content (front facing)
Edit/Create content
Navigate *versions* (back facing "under the hood")

note: versions, revisions, history: key feature of wiki for power users, almost invisible to casual user

ZONE: USER

a user page is an entry
Modifiers (prefs and on-page)

ZONE: SYSTEM

a huge amount of screen estate is devoted to all this stuff, power user/admin oriented design

REGIONS: page regions are pretty basic: header, primary (content), secondary (sidebar), tools, footer

[ repeated within primary: headers, secondary (infoboxes and tocs), tools, footer (category)]

Misc Notes[edit]

17/02/12: just storing some random notes here as I explore

Misc[edit]

An error occurred while changing your watchlist settings for "Extension:Metrics". (jS?)
look for Selenium patterns

CSS[edit]

editing common.css looking for link to css and page diagram: could link go to a page with template?
- https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/MediaWiki:Common.css
pos external editor? how likely is it that skins writers are not already writing with dummies in externals

HTML[edit]

class="mw-editTools" figure out if this html can be updated, if not to lovely lists then at least with some navigable headings/role addition (this is rampant throughout - make list, broach question)
can accesskeys be stripped on pref [[2]]