Forum:2008 main page redesign

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I was having a look at other wikis and saw some stuff that we could add to this wiki's main page as it not very intresting. I know this discussion has happened before but no action has been taken, here a list of some stuff:

• Quote of the Day/week
• Did you know
• On this day (mabe not)

Ok thats it, just thinking these might be nice especially the quote one. ANyone have any thoughts?--Skittles the hog 11:08, 7 August 2008 (UTC)

I know the quote of the week or day was discussed and i think the did you know section would be interesting I'm not sure about the on this day (at the wiki's current level) but the other two would be good aditions Dark Lord Xander 11:23, 7 August 2008 (UTC)

As Dark Lord Xander has said the quote was discussed, at our wiki's level there isn't enough active people who would update a quote on a weekly basis (though there's a discussion floating around about it).

As for the Main Page in general; it was tricky enough fitting what we had on it before the new ad format came in, if we brought in any further elements everything would need reformatting once more. --Tangerineduel 14:08, 7 August 2008 (UTC)

I dont know anything about format but I come on this wiki everyday mostly so I could easily change quotes. There could also be a page were users add quotes that are assesed by someone in charge e.g an admin and those quotes would be inan order for them to be used as the Quote of the day. I agree the On this day thing was a stupid idea but the did you know section would be intresting for fans.--Skittles the hog 15:20, 7 August 2008 (UTC)

With the adverts on the main page to fit around it leaves hardly any room to much around with, that's what I meant by format. I'm not keen on playing around with the main page (as it took some doing to make everything to fit well around the ads). But I'm willing to wait and see what everyone else thinks. --Tangerineduel 17:12, 7 August

2008 (UTC)

I admit it sounds hard work but surely its for the best. I agree that we should wait and see what others think.--Skittles the hog 18:59, 7 August 2008 (UTC)

I think the front page is awfully boring, as well.

The QOTD thing was discussed before elsewhere, and I'm willing to give a shot at coding it. But the thing is, we need to take a decision on how we want to approve the quotes. The quote system on Wookiepedia offers one path. Anyone can nominate a quote, but it must receive a certain number of votes by other people before it's added to the quote rotation. Another model would be that anyone can suggest a quote, and choose what day it'll appear on, but that would mean that anything could get in. Easier to administrate (cause there's no administration beyond getting the coding right), but vulnerable to misuse.

I think a Picutre of the Day is perhaps more "pressing" than QOTD, but there again, we need to decide how to do it. I like MemoryAlpha's administrator-less approach on this one.

I really like the idea of a Did You Know section, especially since we have so few featured articles.

I think that the whole front page doesn't really act well enough as a guide to the wiki. It somehow needs to better point to the various "stratas" of information. But this might be because our category pages in the main have no explanatory text on them. We have so many categories on this wiki, but very little explanation as to how the subcats are related to each other.

Way too much of the front page is devoted to offsite news. That section should be removed and replaced with something pertinent to the site. One-sixth of the site's front page shouldn't be enticing a user to click away from the site. CzechOut ☎ | ✍ 08:34, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

I like Chechs idea of a pic of the day. I think we should try and get QOTD, picture of the day and did u know. I would have a crack at it but unforunatly dont no what all the html stuff means. On the topic of deciding quotes I think there should be a list of quotes and one is taken each day from the top and used. I think thats a good system. But if you can think of somthing better...--Skittles the hog 19:06, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

A picture of the day section would be very easy to administer as the only images that could be used were ones that have been uploaded so the un administered way should be fine as for Quote of the day i think we need to do the voting way to ensure that nothing gets through the only problem with that is that it would be hard to get enough votes at this current time so the number of votes would have to be low (around three) in the initial few months while people become aware of it.

A way to combat this is for adim's (cos i think they are the only ones who could access this) place a notice about voting (for FA's and QOTD) like they do on the star wars wiki for spoilers and stuff about the communtiy Dark Lord Xander 00:45, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

All we need now is an admin to create this with supreme knowledge of html code.--Skittles the hog 13:49, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

Quote of the Day? Brilliant - I'm all for it. Picture of the Day? That's a lot more space and bandwidth, as well as more work to cull, edit and upload. Quote of the Day can be maintained fairly easily and receive contributions from a number of people from a number of sources. Including quotes from actors, writers or members of the production staff could add a lot to it that many people wouldn't run into otherwise, as well as help spark debate/discussion and getting more people to contribute.

An On This Day feature, I'm afraid, would quickly devolve into a list of product releases/airings. Or we include it to include fictional events within the show that occurred on specific dates - the most obvious being the recent rash of Christmas Day events. If either of these things happen, the whole section becomes very complicated and/or boring.--TheOmnius 05:10, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

I (just recently) tried to make the 'on this day' thing work (trying to be all cleaver tying it into current dates and everything...too much trouble than it was worth)...and couldn't. A quote of the ...day is a little bit much, maybe week would be easier to manage. There's a relatively nice amount of space under the spotlight article box. --Tangerineduel 15:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

• • Since I see that Wookieepedia's QotD was mentioned, here is the information and voting process regarding. There are certainly more than enough quotes floating around, I would think that having a new quote each day wouldn't be a problem. The series and audio certainly provide plenty of quotes, including my personal favourite:

Oooooh... defrost your very own Davros.The Eighth Doctor

Though, if you are worried about not having enough quotes to start with, select a large amount of quotes and have those set aside to queue while others start nominating quotes. If you want quotes to be added to the queue quickly, have the amount of votes they require be relatively low to start with, and then later raise the level. To garner interest, putting an announcement at the top may help. Trak Nar ^{Ramble on} 05:39, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

I'm more concerned that we'd all vote on it (and decided) (see Tardis:Nominations for featured articles, which more fizzled than anything). So maybe for now, if you can place the quote without mucking up the formatting on the main page...do so and we'll change quotes in the same random way we change spotlight/feature articles. --Tangerineduel 05:50, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

Nice work to Frogger 2 with the Quote of the Week box...but umm the 'Contents' box shouldn't be appearing on the main page. (I'm not quite sure which bit is actually creating it.) --Tangerineduel 13:20, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

• • • • Concerning the Quote of the Week... Exactly when is it updated? From what I see, it seems to be the Quote of Every Couple Days. It has changed three times this week. And as for future quotes, is there a queue that users can add quotes to? Or is the updating of the quote a "first come, first edit" basis? Trak Nar ^{Ramble on} 09:43, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

Is there some way to see what quotes have been used already, or is there a way to suggest quotes without adding it? I have some ideas but don't know when the quote is to be changed or anything like that. We need a page devoted to Quote of the Week discussion or something. EyeHeartDavidTennant 18:15, 27 January 2009 (UTC)

Done check out Tardis:Quote of the Week discussion. It's still a work in progress, but there's some stuff there. --Tangerineduel 12:33, 28 January 2009 (UTC)