User:SGrabarczuk (WMF)/sandbox/5

Desktop improvements. A new change is coming!

Hello!

Next week (the week of February 6), the Wikimedia Foundation Web team will move some links from the left menu to the right side of the screen.

This will make it easier to intuitively use all the links and tools within our interface. The table of contents will also appear a bit higher up the screen because the left menu will be shorter. The latter change would mostly be interesting for editors, since readers use the left menu significantly more rarely.

Why we are changing this

Currently, our interface does not distinguish between the links and tools that are relevant to the website and the links and tools that are relevant to the page itself. Main page, random page, recent changes, are in the first group. What links here, related changes, cite this page, belong to the second one. This mix is confusing to new readers. Also new editors are not familiar with what each link does. Mixing these groups makes it significantly less likely for people to explore these tools naturally.

This change also addresses the concern for the location of the table of contents. Previously, some editors told us that because the table of contents appeared below the left menu, it was placed too much down below the page. After this change, the left menu will be shorter and thus will shift the table of contents further up in the page. Additionally, this change will reduce the white space on the page by using more of the space for the display of tools.

You can learn more about the page tools feature and the Desktop Improvements project on MediaWiki.org.

Gadgets' compatibility

Some gadgets and user scripts might need to be updated or might become redundant or obsolete. We provide support for users who would like to maintain the compatibility. Please explore this section of our documentation for more information on gadget compatibility.  

Let's work together

• Subscribe to our newsletter to receive regular updates.
• Share your ideas and ask questions on our talk page.
• Create a task on Phabricator and add Desktop Improvements (Vector 2022) tag or write to us if you notice a bug.
• Translate the documentation on MediaWiki.org.

Thank you!