Talk:Main Page

Main Page error reports

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Administrators: Clear all reports

Errors in the summary of the featured article

Please do not remove this invisible timestamp. See WT:ERRORS and WP:SUBSCRIBE. - Dank (push to talk) 01:24, 29 September 2022 (UTC)

Errors in "Did you know ..."

Next DYK

• ... that an Australian crocodile named Burt correctly predicted the 2018 FIFA World Cup final? Can we please not turn the main page into stupid tabloid journalism. We are an encyclopedia, not some outlet to repeat dumb publicity stunts for the gullible. Fram (talk) 11:00, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

• Yeah I'm sorry, but this DYK hook is ... not good. The crocodile didn't "correctly predict" anything, he bit one of two flags that had chicken wings attached to them. The one he bit just happened to be the one of the winning team, so a 50% chance. Notably, he got his previous "prediction" wrong! There are better hooks here - the crocodile was in Crocodile Dundee and was thought to be nearly 100 years old, for example. Black Kite (talk) 11:34, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

Next-but-one DYK

• ... that Soviet studies scholar Katerina Clark rode her bicycle "just about everywhere in the New Haven, Connecticut area, well into her 70s"? Is there really nothing more inspiring, important, exceptional, ... to say about this scholar than that she rode a bike well into her seventies, something utterly unremarkable? DYK hooks are supposed to be interesting. Fram (talk) 11:09, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

Suggested alt:

ALT6: * ... that Katerina Clark wrote "a brave and intelligent study of the Soviet novel"? Gatoclass (talk) 12:09, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

Please note that I have verified the above alt, but because I proposed it, somebody else will have to verify it. It's easy to do, it's the first line of this review. BTW I proposed a new alt because the other alts from the nomination page also suffer from the same rather trivial and tangential content as the bicycle one. Gatoclass (talk) 12:28, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

Errors in "On this day"

Today's OTD

• attacked the British's amphibious evacuation: the possessive reads oddly, and I think is ungrammatical: the more usual phrasing would be "attacked the British amphibious evacuation" or, even better, something like "attacked British troops being evacuated...".

Separately, not an error but a comment: we have five hooks here of which two are focused on England/Britain; one of the other two is focused on the United States; of the four anniversaries, two are Europeans and one a Canadian of European ancestry. Seems a bit narrow in focus, given that there are a lot of significant anniversaries of people and events today centred on the wider world? UndercoverClassicist ^T·C 10:40, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

Errors in the summary of the featured list

Friday's FL

(January 17, tomorrow)

Monday's FL

(January 20)

Errors in the summary of the featured picture

Notice to administrators: When fixing POTD errors, please update the corresponding regular version (i.e. without "protected" in the page title) in addition to the Main Page version linked below.

Today's POTD

• The green iguana - the lengths are given in metric --> (imperial) but the weight is imperial--> (metric). Flip it? JennyOz (talk) 12:06, 15 January 2025 (UTC)

General discussion

Usability and discoverability

I would expect the main page of the encyclopedia to prominently feature both a table of contents and a search feature. This page has a lot of trivia, which is a nice secondary function, but no longer seems to serve its primary functions very well. It does have a search feature, but it's a small icon up at the top in a bar of icons, rather than being front and center and already open with a box to type in words (in the style of a search engine, like [1]).

It's a bit weird we visibly link to Wikipedia:Contents/Portals, but the only link to Wikipedia:Contents (which is important enough it's linked to from every page on the site) is hidden behind the pancake menu icon in the upper left. We do have templates like Wikipedia:Contents/TOC navbar that could be used directly on this page as a better gateway to actual articles, for those that are curious but don't have any particular query in mind or are looking for inspiration. Beland (talk) 20:26, 13 January 2025 (UTC)

Agree about the trivia, but remember opinions here come from the trivia writers. Last time I looked at portal usage statistics, it looks like a few people click to see what they are, and most of them don't click anything further. Art LaPella (talk) 03:55, 14 January 2025 (UTC)

This appears to be an objection to the WP:SKIN, not the contents of Main Page itself. The default skins on desktop and mobile both have a large search box or icon right at the top of every page. The desktop skin also has a link to Wikipedia:Contents in the menu shown on every single page. If you don't like the way that requires opening the menu before that link is visible, I suggest you bring it up on an appropriate talk page for the skin (perhaps Wikipedia talk:Vector 2022) or at the village pump. Modest Genius ^talk 14:09, 14 January 2025 (UTC)

Yes, I'm objecting to the fact that the primary functions of the main page are hidden in a menu and in an icon rather than being directly on - if not the most prominent things on - the page.

Wouldn't changing the skin change all pages? That seems like the wrong answer, since it wouldn't make sense to put the Contents listing on every page, nor would it make sense to have an open search bar on every page. Unlike the main page, I would expect the primary means of navigation to be clicking on links to related articles, as opposed to browsing through topics. (Search is sort of intermediate on those pages, so an icon seems like a good compromise.) -- Beland (talk) 21:52, 14 January 2025 (UTC)

I see no reason why we can't have in the top box "Welcome to Wikipedia" a visually predominant search bar. Doesn't touch the skin. Masem (t) 22:31, 14 January 2025 (UTC)

I have whipped up a search box at Wikipedia:Main Page/sandbox. How does that look? -- Beland (talk) 01:58, 15 January 2025 (UTC)

I like your idea but your design makes the page header (including the recently added editor count) take up 30% of content height on my display, with about 50% of that header wasted grey emptiness. Some smarter (responsive) design will be needed. Bazza 7 (talk) 10:07, 15 January 2025 (UTC)

How about moving the "Other areas of Wikipedia" into that box to fill some of that space?--User:Khajidha (talk) (contributions) 14:32, 15 January 2025 (UTC)

Is that list considered more or less important than the featured content and news sections? -- Beland (talk) 16:19, 15 January 2025 (UTC)

What is the size of your display? Desktop or mobile? -- Beland (talk) 16:18, 15 January 2025 (UTC)

@Beland: large tablet, laptop and phone; it's the first which was problematic, but that's not the point. Good design will accommodate varying display sizes and orientation so as to maximise usage of space and readability. Bazza 7 (talk) 19:28, 15 January 2025 (UTC)

I'm familiar with responsive design; I just wasn't seeing what you were describing and needed to know how to replicate it. I do see what you are saying when I view the site in landscape orientation; my desktop monitor and phone are both portrait. I will try a flex container layout which will make better use of the space. -- Beland (talk) 01:00, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

Can you describe what you would expect in a table of contents for the site? I'm struggling to see how it would work. --User:Khajidha (talk) (contributions) 14:34, 15 January 2025 (UTC)

Above, I suggested using Wikipedia:Contents/TOC navbar. -- Beland (talk) 16:16, 15 January 2025 (UTC)

Probably similar to the old layout that had the list of major portals at the top? That's kind of a table of contents. I think as close as you could get, anyway. ApLundell (talk) 20:00, 15 January 2025 (UTC)

That raises an interesting question: the old layout links to portals like Portal:Mathematics, but the modern navbar links to contents pages like Wikipedia:Contents/Mathematics and logic. I'm assuming the contents pages are more appropriate than the portal pages? IIRC there was an attempt to drop portals from the project entirely (partly because they weren't being maintained?), and perhaps they were removed from the main page for some reason related to that? -- Beland (talk) 01:04, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

Wikipedia Birthday

Since it is Wikipedia's birthday, shouldn't we add that to the "On this day" page? SuperJames888 (talk) 19:45, 15 January 2025 (UTC)

It's a bit late to suggest that, don't you think? It's now the 16th of January in some countries. MadGuy7023 (talk) 19:47, 15 January 2025 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Selected anniversaries/January 15 lists Wikipedia's anniversary as ineligible (in the collapsed staging area) because the Wikipedia article is outdated and its inclusion would be navel-gazing. jlwoodwa (talk) 23:33, 15 January 2025 (UTC)