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Vector: Page-specific items should not be in sidebar toolbox but in actions dropdown
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Description

Page-specific tools should not be in the toolbox on the sidebar, as the toolbar is general site navigation and having page tools there both splits up the tools and makes the sidebar more confusing.

In monobook, this was more of an unavoidable issue simply for lack of space with the tabs, but Vector makes use of dropdowns, allowing for organising more stuff in the same area fairly effectively. Thus the rest of the page tools - link stats, user information, cite options, feedback, etc - should be with the main page tools in the cactions or in a new page information menu next to it, depending on whether the item in question is action or info.


Version: 1.21.x
Severity: normal
See Also:
https://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=24481
https://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=53728

Details

Reference
bz44594

Event Timeline

bzimport raised the priority of this task from to Medium.Nov 22 2014, 1:29 AM
bzimport set Reference to bz44594.
bzimport added a subscriber: Unknown Object (MLST).

(In reply to Isarra from comment #0)

Vector makes use of dropdowns, allowing for organising
more stuff in the same area fairly effectively.

Sure, if by "effectively" you mean "in a way that makes them impossible to find". :) We have regular questions "where is the move button" from clueless vector users...
Only if you're sure that the users will look for that kind of feature in a hidden dropdown, it makes sense to hide stuff in it. Most of the page-related toolbox items are of the serendipity kind and will never be specifically looked after by those not knowing about them.

(In reply to Nemo from comment #1)

(In reply to Isarra from comment #0)

Vector makes use of dropdowns, allowing for organising
more stuff in the same area fairly effectively.

Sure, if by "effectively" you mean "in a way that makes them impossible to
find". :) We have regular questions "where is the move button" from clueless
vector users...

This might be cause the dropdown is not labelled. There's a bug about that (bug 44591) and a patch pending (https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/#/c/112236/), which are a lot less radical that the Vector redesigns that keep floating up but for some reason are not merged yet.

(In reply to Bartosz Dziewoński from comment #2)

This might be cause the dropdown is not labelled. There's a bug about that
(bug 44591) and a patch pending
(https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/#/c/112236/),

Yes, that would probably be useful. However:

(In reply to Isarra from comment #0)

as the
toolbar is general site navigation

I don't see any indication of this being true or possible: most of the items are currently about the page I'm in. Closing this until the premise is confirmed.

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/#/c/136610/1 :


Jforrester
02:44

Patch Set 1:

I'd argue that "more" is less ambiguous that "actions" is misleading, but sure.

The "wiki tools" contain almost entirely page-specific tools, though:

what links here
related changes
permanent link
page information
cite this page

Wiki tools are in the minority here:

upload file
special pages

User-land it's a bit different (block/log/etc.), but for the majority of page impressions this differentiation doesn't hold.


The wiki tools being a minority in the toolbox is something that drives me up the wall. The toolbar is the site navigation, so what the buckets are the page tools even rant rant rant of rant rant rant rant? Rant rant. Rant rant rant rant rant, rant rant rant. Rant.