User:Rubenerd/Technical docs ideas
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So with all this streamlining going on, I figure I'd help out by turning my attention over the technical documentation. Some ideas all thrown in together, take them all with a grain of salt!
Ruben being overly verbose, as usual
Cleaning up categories
It seems the information on how to modify the Wiki is nicely located in the Category:How to category, and the technical information is located... in many places!
It seems a bit redundant having both a Software and Media players category. Other than Firefox and Browser, everything in the former is also in the latter. Should we delete the software category and move Firefox and Browser to the Technical Glossary?
Plus all these categories laid out like this is a bit messy:
What about a layout like this to make info easier to find?
I also like the way Mediawiki clearly and visually separates the content the site is serving, from the documentation on how to use the site. Perhaps by creating a different namespace, or using a basic template on every documentation page, we could do what they do and make the page look slightly different, to help differentiate content from documentation.
As an aside too, I feel we should standardise on the way categories are named. We have Category:Media players, and Category:Platform, one is a plural with two words, one isn't plural and has only one word. To me, plurals make more sense (as we have used namespaces called Artists not Artist) and one word is cleaner that two. "Players" is more succinct than "Media players". Again I'd love to hear feedback on what others think of this
Shakeup: what about a namespace?
Something more drastic: how about a Help namespace to put everything in the How to category, and a Technical namespace... the same way we have seperate namespaces for Artists, Songs and so forth?
Again this would help to compartmentalise (is that a word?) this stuff. Too much trouble for what it's worth, or would it make it easier to fund stuff?
I created a mockup of what a Help namespace contents page would look like!
Footer
It probably comes as no surprise to anyone here that I revel in the technical aspects of wikis and I love adding material of this nature to WWR. I guess I've been using this as a way to redeem myself and make myself useful here. I really don't know much about music to tell the truth, I listen to WWR because I like what I hear :-). I hope I can still be a relevent and helpful contributer.
I could implement a lot of these changes from my end no worries, but just wanted to make sure I was on the right track!
Feedback
Am I being too bold? Are these changes not nessisary? Let me know what you think! Ruben (talk/contribs) 00:52, July 9, 2008 (AKDT)
I like the look of the mockup. I spent a lot of time when I was a new user of WWR looking around and discovering how to do things. I think that people new to WWR and, specially, new to WIKI would benefit most from an easy to use help page. CooleyBufo (talk/contribs) 13:17, July 9, 2008 (AKDT)
There already is a Help namespace. At one time there was a lot of stuff in it that was copied from mediawiki and a lot that we wrote. I think it's a required namespace even though mediawiki doesn't provide much to fill it. A few months ago Jim deleted the super technical stuff and the pages that just pointed to wikimedia. We moved the rest into the main namespace and into the How to category. (Some discussion at the time. Of course, about some thing we may have changed our minds since then.)
One thing I've found in doing both software support and documentation is that people have different styles of learning - some of us look at something and deconstruct it by looking at the code, copying some of it and fiddling around. Some of us need step-by-step instructions with pictures. Some learn best from one-on-one instruction. And so on. How to create helpful materials and forums for all styles of learning on the WWR wiki is something I've paid attention since we went wiki. I think to do so we need some repetition of material (I'm sort of on a tangent here. :) ) Thus I support help/howto pages, graphics, asking in chat, asking Mr. Monkey and so on. And I'm most certainly not suggesting that you do not.
I like the organization of the proposed index. And the colors, too! For starters how's about putting that on the How to category page?
As far as categories go. IMO...
- I don't think we need a platform category - there's only three main platforms. Software would suffice.
- There's enough players to warrant a category. Though Software category would work just fine.
- Glossary... I wonder what the hit counts are on those pages? Maybe just a single page? Or one page for Technical glossary and another for WWR terms.
Later... sparx (talk/contribs) 18:40, July 9, 2008 (AKDT)
Sorry, I'm way late to the party. Probably too late as Ruben is in school - SORRY RUBEN if you were waiting for my input. Just skimming this and quick thoughts (that could likely change with more thought/time):
- Yes, we already have a Help: namespace. We can definitely use it. I'm pretty sure Sparx is referring to my bold machete strokes a month or so ago when I went through the jumble tumble of wires and spaghetti laying around and tries to simplify. I may, or may not, have succeeded in that.
- There are probably already some category tools to help visualize cats in the extensions library. I'd like to test some of these extensions but haven't gotten around to it. I think a visual layout of cats would be very helpful.
- I have a pretty strong opinion about cats getting too sub-divided, too difficult for the average person to maintain, and their ultimate usefulness. I sympathize strongly with a scenario when you start out with Cat:Software and then sub-divide to Cat:Players and then put Cat:Players into Cat:Software etc etc and it just makes my head swim. Off the top of my head, the only reason WWR would go to the trouble of that level of categorization is with music. We're going to flaunt our expertise in that area. But sub-dividing software, recipes, photos, etc. much beyond 2 levels seems bound to always need maintenance that only the original categorizer will want to do. I'm probably guilty of over-categorizing but I've been trying to make much broader and generalized cats preferring to have a single well-used resource Category:Listeners rather than 5 unused smaller cats. Oh, and BTW, I strongly dislike the format that wikimedia uses for listing subcats on cat pages at the top. It's confusing as hell even when you know what you're doing.
- When it comes to "big changes" I tend to be a "show me" sort of designer. I trust people of Ruben's technical ability so I'm not worried about some huge change that messes something up. It's no problem if you set up a test template and throw it on a few pages and ask for feedback. If it's something that requires a ton of pre-work and you don't want to go to the trouble without knowing it'll 'stick' in the end, then, well, it's still a good idea to do a minimal prototype so people can see what you're suggesting. Bottom line: Go for it. As long as you're cool with stuff being adapted, shifted, dropped, reworked, etc. it'll be a positive experience.
Gotta go. Esther here for a walk with Beta. Sorry, didn't proof so lots of grammar errors.
Jim (talk/contribs) 14:56, July 20, 2008 (AKDT)
Technical? Gerk. Are my eyes glazing over yet? Do whatever, and then I'll let you know how I feel about it. 
— Mert (talk/contribs) 07:47, August 23, 2008 (AKDT)
