Does anyone else think the complexity of the markup is an explanation declining editorship?
Does anyone else think the complexity of the markup is an explanation declining editorship?
I'm surprised that no there doesn't seem to be any discussion on this page about the difficulty of the Wikipedia markup as a possible explanation for declining editorship. I have been lurking around in the corners of the project for long time, doing my thing rather anonymously since 2003 (and fleeing flamewars at the slightest indication).
But I think we long-time editors can't see just how nuts the markup has become. nuts, nuts, nuts. Yeah, that's right friends and neighbors, writing nuts takes TEN APOSTROPHES. In what way is this easier than HTML? To put it bluntly, the current state of the markup makes the very name of "Wiki" a hypocritical label. It's not quick. It's slow, it's confusing, it's a pain in the ass.
And don't even get me started on the templates and the infoboxes and the totally undreadable reference notation. Hey, I'm as guilty as anyone. And I don't know how to fix it. But clearly, surely, making editing easier has to become a very high priority if the project is to continue growing. I'm not trying to pick a fight -- I really love Wikipedia and Wikimedia. So can we please talk about what needs to happen to fix this?
Ummm... well... I must accept that I am rather puzzled by the format. I certainly avoid using more than a few percent of its features, let alone its conventions. Given the sheer volume of published material I am intimidated by the thought of replacing it, but I also am wondering about what to put in its place; A Latex dialect? HTMLtidy?
What I really am worried about is that someone will get the bit between his teeth and do something rash. At least the current system works; what is the gusrantee that any new option
- will work at all
- will work on all platforms
- will meet all Wiki needs
- will be future-proof (yeah, yeah, I know! But still...)
Rash changes are already happening. Some benighted IT-specialist changed the sorting of categories: lots and lots of work down the drain, and a lot of new categories to be created (software specialists should not be allowed to work unsupervised: logic is the enemy of knowledge). - Brya 16:49, 7 May 2011 (UTC)
I agree entirely that the complexity may be putting new editor's off.
I am one ... I signed up a few weeks ago and when I finally tried to add something about my chosen topic (Piaggio Ape Calessinos) I just found it too difficult to even start to do a simple thing like correct a broken link to a non existent Piaggio web site. So I gave up and figured that maybe I needed to go on a training course or spend a few hours reading how I am supposed to do it!
I have used computers for 30 years and have a number of my own web sites and blogs but I just don't know how to contribute to Wikipedia (yet). I will persevere but I am sure we might well be missing out on plenty of improved information from people out there who are just too busy to learn a whole new speciality.
Lets hope things get easier, soon.
Regards, David Robbins (not logged on, apparently!)
Great point David Robbins. 95% of what I have been reading in this discussion is exactly the kind of "Inside Baseball" that discourages newcomers!
I actually think this person was understating the problem. I'm also a new user and I came here and shortly after I started I realized there was a lot of citation needed marks all over a lot of pages. So I figured, hey what about those papers I wrote the other day, they had cites in them, maybe I can match up here. However I have since had an insane time trying to make proper citations. I had to re-edit my last citation I made 4 times. The problem is that I'm copying other user's cites to use as templates and quick simple templates that should be at the fingertips of users from post 1 are... difficult to find, they are not even included in the beginner info in the my talk section.
We see loads of pages that are written by people who look like professionals and write long well informed paragraphs with no cites and it's no wonder, even if they have the data to back it up, just figuring out how to make a simple cite is bonkers. Many academic institutions won't accept Wikipedia as a source and the sourcing on Wikipedia actually allows people to use some of the information here in an academic setting. I think this is a chronic problem and partially related to the real reason for the decline in membership. These people who want to use to help source papers are potential source contributors themselves but it requires the process to be a little less difficult than pulling teeth on a chicken.
I think a simple page with good and simple templates linked to on the edit page could help. I also think it's possible to make a simple device using pull-down tabs to specify the type of media and clearly entered data to actually make professionally formatted citations that they could then cut and paste to where they want them. We need a quick user friendly cite creator tool.
Hi 70.71.15.41. Do you not see the cite tool where you're editing? It is essentially what you're asking for. I used to edit citations like you (copying and editing the cites of other people) and it was awful: this tool solves that problem.
I think it's enabled as part of Vector by default on all language-versions, but a few people around the office tell me they don't see it, probably because they've customized their interface with a gadget that displaces it.
Here's a screencapture. 
Essentially, you click "Cite" on the upper right, which reveals the Templates pulldown.
Hi Sue. I've never seen that, so I guess I tweaked my interface. If I did, I have no recall of how I did it, or how to fix it, or what "Vector" is, or... But anyway, even if there is a wizard with macros for generating the markup, the problem as I see it isn't generating the markup -- it's the markup itself.
Here's a dramatization of the conundrum, as I see it:
Yeah, the solution needs to go beyond macros, shortcuts, and buttons. It has to go into full "WYSIWYG" mode. I know that takes time.
Babbage, your image is hilarious: I posted copies around the office. Yes, you and RandomRan are correct: we need the Visual Editor (WYSIWYG). The cite tool's just a short-term workaround which fixes one particularly annoying problem.
I agree that the complexity prevents me from being as bold as I'd like to be. Not for making minor changes, but to create an article, make a major change, do a reference in the proper format. It's a little daunting and, though I am technically adept, I just can't be bothered to remember or even learn complicated formats. I like that anyone can edit, but we should be helped more. The editing helps at the top of the Edit Box (Bold, Italic, Link, Advanced, Help, ...) are a nice step in the right direction. More could be done. Maybe with "wizards" helping people do the most common things.
I agree with the above editor's comments. People who are accustomed to the user friendliness of today's high-tech devices are highly unlikely to be drawn to an environment where you have to place three apostrophes before and after a word to make it bold. There's simply no way Mac-savvy 20-somethings who were weaned on wordprocessing and PlayStations are going to find that cool. Without an easier-to-use interface, Wikipedia can only look forward to a continuing drop-off in participation.
I also support the Foundation's efforts to encourage a more welcoming approach to newcomers and a healthier culture among veterans. I would note, however, that even with an improved IU, the seriousness and tedium of what we do will remain so. If there has been a decline in general friendliness, part of that has to be related to the fact that we as editors have raised the bar in terms of what's acceptable for "publication". Yes, there's a nice way to tell somebody their edit sucks, but it still amounts to rejection. Furthermore, contributions by newcomers and casual visitors create a backlog of work that is impossible to keep up with. For example, a random, valid drop-in in an article can take anywhere from 15 minutes to an hour to verify and cleanup. While I prefer that to simply ripping out unsourced entries, I also know that I'm taking time away from larger, more productive, more interesting matters.
What I'm getting at is that the Foundation needs to consider that to maintain quality, standards must be enforced (which is not the reality now in regards to verifiability). However, if you require people to provide a source for the information they want to add, now you've put up a barrier to recruitment. But just to give one example of the possibilities, it would not be unreasonable to require editors to provide a source for what they add, and we could make the requirement more friendly by providing a form that might even allow something as lame as "I saw it on television." Then the software could ask them, "What station?"
Of course, this is one of the recommendations of the study and a new WYSYWYG editor is being created; so it is apparent that everyone agrees this is a big problem that can be resolved.
Aye, Imersion is right this is a big priority of the Foundation. You can see some of the ideas on the Product Whitepaper and the Strategic Plan (I think there is something more specific about it.. I'm going too look around ) but it's definitely a priority.
Thanks for the responses. I'm very happy to hear a WYSIWYG is in the works. Allreet 21:40, 6 May 2011 (UTC)
"IU"? Hm. A good example of why folks are turned off. Let's see . . . ah, I know! IU=IntraUterine! But what does that have to do with Wikipedia? Or WP, as we call it? Oh, by the way, what does "Bump this thread" mean? Questioningly, your pal,
Hello,
indeed, when I got acquainted with the Wikipedia code, it seemed to me a little bit confusing. But is it not the same e. g. with VIM and others? No, the technical steps can be surmounted; and I quickly did. Once you have managed it, you enter a wide prairie ... --Hellsepp 18:52, 6 May 2011 (UTC)
One of the problems with the complexity is that there has never been a good funneling system to the pages that provide clear instructions. If every new editor for the last five years had been funneled directly to the Wikipedia:Tutorial when they first decided to edit, in a way that actually made them try it before opting out and then given a link to the Wikipedia:cheatsheet, and then when they wanted to create their first article, were directed first to the Wikipedia:Article wizard before starting, again in a way that made them start there before opting out, many problems would have been avoided.--Fuhghettaboutit 18:49, 7 May 2011 (UTC)
I agree that a good WYSIWYG editor ought to be a top Foundation priority, and improving user friendliness of the help system a top priority of Wikipedians. For instance, just today I came across a talk page (of Wikipedia:Uploading Images) where people were clearly ending up needing help and not knowing how to get somewhere like the helpdesk, so I added a note.
In addition, Fuhghettaboutit's point about funnelling brings up the current RFC on autoconfirmed status in order to create articles. This might superficially sound "anti-openness", but as a draft of how it might look in practice shows (here), it's really not, it's just directing users to choose from several assistance options for article creation when their account is brand new. This should ensure a better experience for newcomers.
While I disagree on the auto-confirmed idea incredibly strongly ( we just do not have any way to do it cleanly and without making it into either a hoop jump that will lose a lot of people or a useless exercise that will lose good people and keep bad) there are a lot of things that could be improved that will help both new and experienced users alike (and I think help with deletion backlogs etc).
The WYSIWYG piece is obviously important and like I said above a very high priority for the foundation right now, including Mediawiki 2.0 which includes redoing the parser to allow for much more. The other thing that you bring up for the help system is, I think, key. This includes all of the pieces from on wiki documentation, to peer to peer mentoring system to offline help like IRC or OTRS. For example if you start sorting through the Help TOC's on English Wikipedia they are a total mess leading every which way and frustrate me I can't imagine how they frustrate new users. Sadly things like the the article wizard and AfC also need to have total reworks before they could even think of taking large loads on without major issues but if they get those renovations could be helpful regardless. Have you seen the Commons image uploading cartoon? Something like that which was adjustable for project specific rules would be great for the image uploading page you were talking about.
"we just do not have any way to do it cleanly" - well as you can gather from my proposal [1] here, I think it can be done perfectly cleanly, and need not feel like a hoop to newcomers at all (see here), but rather a choice of help options.
Wizard/AFC could do with a lot of improvement, yes; like bringing in Javascript or linking to examples in a systematic way. But even without that, I think it's better than allowing newcomers a blank canvas and no clue what to do, getting it inevitably wrong, and then leaving in frustration. (But let's not make this thread about that - the RFC and talk page are quite enough...) Rd232 04:09, 8 May 2011 (UTC)
Why not have a link to the new article wizard in the sidebar? There are already links for creating books and uploading files, why not have one for creating an article? It would say something like "create new article" or "start an article" and link to the article wizard.
Yes, any mature article will be absolutely littered with templates, infoboxes and tables and even more obscure stuff even I don't understand. It is too much to expect anyone new, with the exception of vandals, to have the confidence to edit something they cannot comprehend. I note the OP complains of the double and triple apostrophe markup. In fact this was introduced to make wiki-markup simpler than html. If it had just stopped there, or continued with the principle of only introducing markup for simplification we would not have a problem now. Spinningspark 10:24, 8 May 2011 (UTC)
Yeah, it's ironic that WP markup was originally intended to make HTML simpler. (But what possessed someone to use the *same* character for bold and italic is beyond me...)
One simple usability win, maybe, would be a simple option to hide all templates, citations, and infoboxes. Couldn't this be done without too much drastic software development? In Javascript, even?
I love MediaWiki's syntax. But, I've been using it for years. And I'm a crotchety grognard who loves plain text and hates GUI editors. At least one friend, someone with a Master's in CS, declared that while they'd like to edit Wikipedia a little, they don't feel it's worth their time to learn the syntax. (This might not be a problem by itself, but they perceive Wikipedia as more than a little hostile, but that's a different thread.)
Theory: A high quality GUI editor would help. Of course, it's going to need to be able to handle MediaWiki's complexity, or at least elegantly "punt," simply rendering particularly complex things and limiting GUI editing to "delete or leave alone."
Do you love it because of the fact that you know how powerful it is given that you've learned it, or do you love it because you think the "design" of the markup itself is beautiful? I actually admit to finding the devious ins and outs of Mediawiki syntax fun, myself. But I think that's because I'm so neck-deep in using it after all these years. Noobs definitely don't feel this way upon first encountering the syntax -- they think their browser threw up.
The wiki markup language is sweet, simple, and easy to use. I have already converted several of my html sites to wiki sites after learning to use wiki markup. I am currently converting three more of them to wiki sites. No, the real problem for me is hostile editors, not wiki markup language. 64.142.90.33 05:06, 18 May 2011 (UTC)