Classic WoW Wiki talk:Styling

''Much of this is taken from WoWWiki talk:Village pump. See Schmidt's edit on that page.''

Minor CSS tweaks
Unless I hear someone screaming NOOOOO in the very near future, I'm going to submit a few CSS patches to Rustak, which I hope he'll add:
 * Make clicked links a bit brighter; they're hard to read sometimes, especially so in anything-but-dark rooms.
 * Make TOCs darker (#282828) than the standard page (#333333) rather than lighter. Everything in TOCs is links so they'll become easier to read - and it'll look better =)

--Mikk 09:30, 17 June 2006 (EDT)

Both of those ideas sound good to me! -- Kirkburn 09:51, 17 June 2006 (EDT)


 * As well as that, ask also if he can change the default skin to monobook, transfer all code from current css formatting to mediawiki:monobook.css. This would allow us admins to change the formatting accordingly, and also we could add further stuff, such as

.tooltip { Category:WoW Utility Templates background-color:#111111; border:1px solid #bbbbbb; float:right; width:20em; padding:1ex; margin:0 0 1ex 1ex; color: white; }
 * Also, to drop the css code for the corner image so that mediawiki software will choose image:wiki.png. (In case anyone's wondering, image:wiki.jpg, to the best of my understanding, won't work.) We could still use the orc icon (he doesn't like what's currently at wiki.png). I don't care. But when the time comes to change the icon, I'd like to be able to do that right away. (But maybe he wants it that way. ;p ) Schmidt 15:08, 17 June 2006 (EDT)


 * Uhm, no, I'm not lumping in a quick "please apply this diff here" request with a jobload like that. I want it to actually get done =) --Mikk 18:46, 17 June 2006 (EDT)


 * /me votes for both! =) -- Kirkburn 19:24, 17 June 2006 (EDT)


 * Then you can just direct him here :) Schmidt 01:41, 18 June 2006 (EDT)


 * I'm not quite following the reasoning here. Why does it have to be monobook.css? Is that the only one the non-shell-access-admins can edit? If so, wouldn't we be screwing over people that use other skins if we only keep monobook up to date? (Is the solution just the scrap all the other skins? =)) --Mikk 09:31, 18 June 2006 (EDT)

I've sent Rustak an updated wowwiki/main.css that, in my opinion, solves some of the worst problems with the skin. E.g. selected history/diff lines being unreadable, new pages list being unreadable, the metadata box for images not being readable, not enough spacing before &lt;h1&gt;s / &lt;h1&gt;s... and some minor tweaks. Shouldn't be a shock to anyone used to the skin, but doesn't solve the skinning problems either. --Mikk 11:47, 19 June 2006 (EDT)

Styling
user:ElusiveByte removed formatting from Interface Customization due to not looking good with Nostalgia skin. What comments do you all have? Please leave them here, since it should be considered a wiki-wide discussion. That type of formatting he didn't like pervades this wiki. Schmidt 22:59, 18 June 2006 (EDT)


 * He's absolutely right about using skin styles. Problem is.... there are none. And whatever we use needs to be in all skins. --Mikk 05:51, 19 June 2006 (EDT)


 * Hm, I lie. They don't. It'll only look boring in other skins. Come to think of it, I'm going to download the wowwiki skin and give it an overhaul and mail it to Rustak and refer to this discussion and solve this matter once and for all. --Mikk 06:01, 19 June 2006 (EDT)


 * On a sidenote... wouldn't it be Bloody Wonderful if Rustak could set up FTP access to the skins directory and hand out user names and passwords to a select few? I wouldn't being one of those ;-)  (I'll start out by mailing him about that I think..)   --Mikk 06:01, 19 June 2006 (EDT)


 * I would rather not have FTP access, but that the skins would be in MediaWiki software where they belong, such as MediaWiki:Monobook.css and other appropriate areas. But note that even if you use Monobook to display your pages, MediaWiki:Monobook.css will have no effect on it. :( What I would rather have is that it did.
 * This also is why I want to make use of the skins so that we can use classes. Classes are so much better (especially when you have a situation like this where you can choose skins), but right now we can't make use of them. Schmidt 09:11, 19 June 2006 (EDT)

Pulled from the talk page of the aforementioned page:
 * Not looking good was an understatement. Nostalgia uses the standard link coloring (dark blue, dark purple), which is.. well... basically not readable with dark backgrounds. --Mikk 12:13, 19 June 2006 (EDT)


 * The proper markup is much more important than the style. I made sure the default rendering of the markup looks fine in other skins. It currently looks horrible in Nostalgia, which I use because I have a hard time reading the default skin. If you want the links to look pretty, until such time that you are willing to spend the effort to use *class* definitions from the skin stylesheets to create the desired style, no style is better. Even if you have to author the custom classes for whatever skin you use. It's you who wishes to add the "style"; you should do the work. You should not do it half-assedly then make those who use other skins suffer. Usablity is much more important that style. - ElusiveByte.


 * Well said, and I had the same idea quite some time ago. I asked in what I had hoped to be a popular place so others would read it and comment, but there was no result. I had asked if anyone used any other skin. Now we know. That said, you seem, due to the lack of prior interest, to be the only one or one of the very, very few to have an issue with this. Is the default "wowwiki" skin so great a burden to read? This is not the only wiki to use dark backgrounds and white text. Memory-Alpha is another, except they use the "Monobook.css" but completely modified to look similar to this. Schmidt 23:32, 19 June 2006 (EDT)


 * For reference, these pages look like this in Nostalgia and Monobook:
 * Interface Customization as ElusiveByte edited it: nostalgia monobook
 * Main Page: nostalgia monobook
 * Main Page Dev 3: nostalgia monobook
 * Templates: nostalgia monobook


 * ElusiveByte, insulting us isn't going to help. It would be better to explain why the default skin doesn't work for you and how we can improve it, rather than shouting at us for stuff we've worked hard on. The default style of the wiki is the one it is desgined around, there's no gettign around that. We're not wikipedia and we have limited resources to check the designs in every skin that available :)
 * The style sheets are being discussed, but unfortunately only Rustak, the admin, is able to do stuff directly atm. I'm glad Main Page Dev 3 looks okay in the other skins though :) -- Kirkburn 07:31, 20 June 2006 (EDT)


 * Kirkburn, I did a poor job of curbing my frustration when I wrote that. I appologize to all. Just so everyone understands, I removed the custom, hard-coded colors from that page, and explained in my summary how in-line styles hurt users of other skins. When I came back later, the author of the in-line styles had reverted my change with no address to the real problem. I got frustrated and wrote what you see above. I don't see that it was all that insulting. Had I left out "half-assedly", it would have been much more professional, though.


 * I stand by my general statement: If you want custom colors for certain layout elements (borders, div backgrounds, etc), those colors should be defined in classes in the css file of the skin of your choice. Then, if users of other skins wish to implement your classes in the css file for their skin, they will do that work. Using inline styles for colors forces every viewer of that page, regardless of what skin they have selected, to see those colors. That is not a very friendly practice. It makes it very hard for me to read with my desired skin.


 * So you see, when I made the page readable for everyone (but less colorful), and the original author simply reverted my change, I took that as an offense myself. My comment originally appeared on that specific page's discussion page. Taken out of context of that discussion, yes, it sounds harsh, so I wrote all of this to explain my position. ElusiveByte 18:49, 21 June 2006 (EDT)


 * Just a small factual correction: I'm the main author of the page (as it is today), and I wasn't the one that reverted it ;)


 * And, yes, I think we all agree that this is a problem. We hope to have something happen pretty soon. I for one will jump over the ability to tweak stylesheets live and make templates and colorful pages use classes from the skins. --Mikk 16:59, 21 June 2006 (EDT)

I just got a brilliant idea. How about we make a demo CSS file of sorts and we can include all the classes we want, to fit the skin we all use. Then we format those same classes everwhere else. Then neither Rustak nor anyone else has to wade through all the classes and design a new skin, if you get my drift. Also, periodically we can email Rustak (or he might patrol) and then, until he sets it up so that we can edit it ourselves, he can post that CSS formatting to whatever he has. How about that? How about moving this discussion to WoWWiki talk:Styling and develping a CSS file at Styling/wowwiki.css or some such? Any better ideas?

Thanks for your explanation, ElusiveByte, and as Mikk said, we tend to agree, but as I said too, we didn't have anyone complaining about it so we didn't think there was an issue. Schmidt 17:24, 21 June 2006 (EDT)


 * Go for it. I've got plenty ideas of how to design useful classes that I'd like to throw around. --Mikk 21:09, 21 June 2006 (EDT)

When I mailed the new main.css (with the minor tweaks) to Rustak, the discussion slided over onto being able to edit skins from inside the Wiki. He's aware of the problem, and we talked about different ways of fixing it. (Won't say more here as I don't know how much he wants public.) --Mikk 17:18, 20 June 2006 (EDT)


 * I guess it'll be evident when it happens then. Thanks. I guess it might have benefitted everyone if I had done similarly with main.css some while back. I didn't think that one through. Schmidt 06:42, 21 June 2006 (EDT)

Updated skin
Ooh, purple ;) Now can we do something about getting the new front page implemented please. The current one is inadequate and out of date. Tbh, I don't see a need to vote on it as the other are also out-of-date and already have most of their content on Main_Page_Dev_3. =) Poke, poke, pole! -- Kirkburn 15:03, 20 June 2006 (EDT)


 * Well, more of a blueish-gray. Either way, it's much brighter than it used to be. The regular links are also brighter, which means they shine less in text -- not being too distracted by colorful blobs is good for reading comprehension. (Aye, my better half works with layout. Does it show? >.<)  --Mikk 15:07, 20 June 2006 (EDT)


 * At best, it doesn't make sense. Why doesn't each page call a skin page that we can change? We're still at a loss to set up classes. :( Whom does this change help? Schmidt 16:01, 20 June 2006 (EDT)


 * o.O You're confusing two discussions. This is the result of my "minor css tweaks" post a ways back, which was something I was hoping could be fixed fairly quickly, and, lo and behold, it was. Notice for instance how Special:Newpages is actually readable now, and how you can actually read the two first lines of page history, not just see two big white blocks, and a couple of other minor tweaks and fixes. And no, it doesn't help squat with the using-different-skins issue. I can't fix that by mailing Rustak a new main.css =P --Mikk 17:13, 20 June 2006 (EDT)

(I'm now posting something re: skinning in btw.. --Mikk 17:16, 20 June 2006 (EDT))