Community Wishlist Survey 2021/Archive/Text layout on desktop that is not like www of 1990s

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Text layout on desktop that is not like www of 1990s

  • Problem: Default text layout on wide screens looks like www of the 1990s. Long line lengths (should never be more than ~120 chars) Images of all sizes, on all sides, text squeezed in between. Desktop desperately needs a makeover.
  • Who would benefit: Modern readers
  • Proposed solution: Majority of readers are anonymous, make Vector skin default for all. WP:BEBOLD. Limit en:line length. Put images in the right margin, if too big allow part of them left of the margin; allow few predefined image widths, or any width but with some additional effort.
  • More comments: Some good ideas here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:TheDJ/responsiveContent. Wiki pages look better on wikiwand too.
    Update 2020/11/21: I've received a message from Web team, some changes are underway. Hopefully all wikis will get them soon, I think it's high time. I would be happy to see support here for the changes they have planned.
  • Phabricator tickets:
  • Proposer: Ponor (talk) 06:45, 17 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Discussion

This is already being worked. Go to Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-rendering and uncheck "Use Legacy Vector". In some wikis is already default. -Geraki TL 09:52, 17 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@Ponor: As per guidelines, "Proposals should be discrete, well-defined tasks". I personally don't think that this one classifies in its current state. --AKlapper (WMF) (talk) 13:47, 17 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@AKlapper (WMF) and Geraki:"Good design sells product", that's why I think this is very important. Most readers on WP are, I believe, guest/anonymous users, so it doesn't really matter for them if there are options to change this or that, somewhere. Yes, Vector skin is a step in the right direction, but en:line length should still be shorter. And I'm proposing the images be put in the margin, scaled to a predefined width (or one from a set of predefined widths). Please log out and tell me if this looks like a decent, modern encyclopedia article or a scrapbook: STM (old rev). As to the actions: limit line width, put images in the margin, make articles on desktop look as good as articles on mobile or in the app. Ponor (talk) 14:58, 17 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Ponor: I did not argue whether things could look better or not. I argued about the scope of this very Community Wishlist proposal. It seems that your reply misses my point. :) --AKlapper (WMF) (talk) 19:38, 17 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]