Wikimedia Meta-Wiki

What to do with www.wikipedia.org

See also Wikipedia and corporate structure ... what?

This is a discussion page. Currently, www.wikipedia.org redirects to en.wikipedia.org, which is the URL for the English Wikipedia; nothing has been changed yet. Please add your ideas and opinions. As of now, www.wikipedia.org displays a multilingual portal page

New 2003-12-07 Rough proof-of-concept page: http://www.wikipedia.org/portal

This demo script tries to figure out what languages you're likely to be looking for, based on the Accept-Language header your browser sends out and/or the top-level country domain you're visiting from. It highlights these languages in the complete list, and adds an extra welcome message and link at the top. It's just a demo, and is neither complete nor attractive. :) --Brion VIBBER 14:24, 7 Dec 2003 (UTC)

Link dead as of March 15, 2004. Pcb21 08:47, 15 Mar 2004 (UTC)
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We could have some kind of cookie set up so that the first time visitors to www.wikipedia.org are allowed to select their language and then after that it's automatic. I mean, it shouldn't be a big deal to an English speaker to have to click English to get to the main site... it goes a long way toward making a Wikipedia a neutral-language project. I also think it could make it easier to add the multi-lingual features that we've all been waiting for...

The main page should attempt to negotiate
the correct default language with the browser

I think it might be cool to have a quick paragraph describing the Wikipedia project in each of the active languages on the main page. This way, we get a chance to introduce newbies to the project and show them the multilingual nature of our project at the same time.

Proposition1

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I propose a format like below for first time visitors of www.wikipedia.org:

Yes, it can get awfully big. Are we running out of space somewhere? ;-)

I meant screen space. It's a bit cluttered and doesn't fit on my screen. ;) --BV

Use Browser's Preferred Language

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In your browser's preferences (or options) you can select your preferred languages. Most browsers use the language you installed your browser with as preferred, that is, if you install a German Netscape you will have "German" as your preferred language. This preference can be interpreted by the web server. If you use a German browser you can be welcomed by the German text. At the bottom of the page we could have flags for other languages. -- JeLuF

Yes, that's quite doable. For a somewhat similar example see http://www.esperanto.net/ -- it tosses up a brief welcome message & the title of the site in your preferred language (if available) and then has a list of all the languages that additional info is available in. --BV

Simple Design

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how about a simple design like this:

WIKIPEDIA
ENGLISH:
Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia		 DEUTSCH:
Wikipedia, die freie Enzyklopädie 		FRANÇAIS:
Wikipedia: l'encyclopedie libre		 ESPAÑOL:
Wikipedia: Enciclopedia Libre Universal
Esperanto: <u>Vikipedio: .... Dansk: Wikipedia, den frie encyclopædi ... ...

Por Favor!!! Huiquipedia hace doler la vista!

Please, Huiquipedia hurt the eyes. I don't think any Spanish speaking person has a paticular problem with the ortography of Wikipedia...AstroNomer


Oh? It was suggested on the mailing list that one reason for the Spanish Fork (or for their refusal to rejoin) was that they consider the name "Wikipedia" to be foreign-sounding in Spanish. "Huiquipedia" was suggested as a more native-sounding alternative, like Eo has Vikipedio. If "Wikipedia" is okay in Spanish, great -- Tarquin
The suggestion was made by someone that was trying to find a cause, not that knew them :)

¡Viva Huiquipedia! I also suggest changing Wikipédia to Wikipédie, since French for encyclopedia is encyclopédie.

Mav's proposal

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Mav's Prop

Where's this "consensus" that the English-language wikipedia should be moved to en.wikipedia.org? I don't see it. --The Cunctator

I haven't heard anyone say no except you, so far. --Brion VIBBER 18:26 Oct 10, 2002 (UTC)

Everywhere it's been discussed (the meta, Wikipedia-l and Intlwiki-l) I've heard nothing but support. Yours is the first contrary voice I've heard. That doesn't make any concerns you might have invalid (what are those concerns?), but you can't complain about a lack of discussion or widespread agreement. --Stephen Gilbert 01:40 Oct 11, 2002 (UTC)

Ok, I'm still going through today's batch of mail, and I see more people are voicing opposition. I'm not in a hurry. --Stephen Gilbert 01:48 Oct 11, 2002 (UTC)

For the record, I think it's an excellent idea, putting the English language Wikipedia on en.wikipedia.org, and making www.wikipedia.org point (in some fashion--automatic forwarding would be cool) to the various wikipedias; it will help the other language projects a lot and not significantly harm (if harm at all) the English project. It's a little thing that says so much about the project's commitment to being an integrated international project, which is how I always thought the general project of a free encyclopedia should be. I definitely think we need to make *very* sure that present links to www.wikipedia.com and www.wikipedia.org (there are zillions) are not broken, before we make the change. --Larry Sanger

Mav's proposal is unfortunately ill-considered. Wikipedia should not be presented as an "interlinked set of open content, neutral and professional w:encyclopedias". Wikipedia is, and should be "a complete encyclopedia", not separate projects. --The Cunctator

OK if the symantics of claiming there is only one encyclopedia is important to you then change the wording -- I thought I was clear on stating there is only one project. I was trying to emphasize that the non-English language Wikipedias are not mere translations of the same version. If you can get that across AND still say there is only one encyclopedia then all the power to you. --Maveric149 18:47 Oct 12, 2002 (UTC)
In the broshure I made for advertising Wikipedia in Esperanto, I explicitly emphasized that it was a multilingual, international project - "the first truly international encyclopedia in the world, simultaneously edited and published in multiple languages" where "articles in each language are interlinked", with an approximate summed article count from all languages listed for the pedia as a whole as well as a single-languge stat or two. I think that's a better way to present the project; but yes, care should be taken not to give the impression that they're just translations of one another. Some articles are translations (or start that way), but not all, and not all in the same direction. --Brion VIBBER 21:12 Oct 12, 2002 (UTC)


This is somthing very important. The question is realy not "What to do whit www.wikipedia.org?" but "Is wikipedia one big encyclopedia whit pages in different languages or a federation of more ore less indepentent Wikipedias working toghter under the Wikipedia non-proffit organisation umbrella."

I am very strong against the idea of the first. Every Wikipedia should be abel to say that the are 'Wikipedia XX' Not just the xxxx-pages of Wikipedia.org Every Wikipedia should have there own wiki. So that that the can develop there own reputation and style whit there own clear url.

Whit of cource very strong cooperation between all wikipedias.

Compaire it whit the different distros of linux. Every distro is a language. Some are bigger and more know than others (Redhat= the english wikipedia)and some are very small and not very know (wikipedia NL=coyote linux) but the have al there own way of doing things, there own identity, proud but still working toghter on thesame thing under te same flag, the label; linux/wikipedia.

Then there is also the old wisdom "Never put al youre eggs in the same basket."(or somthing like that) I find it dangerous to murge the database and the working of the software together so the become one part.

You never know what will come in the next years. I am absolutly for a large wikipedia federation and against forking. But if nessesary it should be easy to do. If some (sad) day the wikipedia project should break-up because of a legal matter, lack of funding change of core policy change or so, the homeless ex-wikipedias should be abel to go there own way and find a new way to exist on there own.

Giskart

I only see benefits with the "one database" idea. Each Wikipedia article will simply have a language tag and therefore can be sorted, stored or backed-up based on that. The default behavior of each Recent Changes would be to display only the Recent Changes for that language. All linking within articles in a particular language will be only to articles in that same language. Again, you could still backup just one language by selecting the correct language tag and create your own wiki in just that language if you wanted.

In short everything will work the way it does now for the Phase III wiki except we will be able to have one login, one user contribs list (probably with sorting functions by language), and also have the ability to display whatever combination of language you want in Recent Changes. This also makes it possible to have a Recent Changes available directly at www.wikipedia.org that by default displayed each edit made in each and every language. In addition to this users would be able to select which language interface they want globally or based on individual language space (Then a person who knows Esperanto could set as their default to have their interface display in Esperanto no matter what language they happen to be in or they could select this on a case by case basis for each language). Of course each language should be able to set their own global defaults, logos etc.

Having everything in separate database severly complicates many of these things and probably prevents them for practical reasons such as server load. Keeping things separate also means that whenever there is a software update that a developer has to reinstall each separate wiki instead of just one. The fact that everything would be in one database will not be noticable other than the fact that everything works so nicely together. "All our eggs" would not be in the same basket -- we will still have periodic backups in several different geographic locals and having everything in one database will not complicate having static mirrors. Also the magic of RAID and high-speed LAN allows for the creation of a computer cluster to handle the eventual need for more CPU power and larger buses. Thus there is little reason to keep things separate. --Maveric149 22:07 Oct 16, 2002 (UTC)

If you are sure that there is no problem to split of a wikipedia in case of problems then i have nothing against it. The new things possibel whit the one database way you speak of sounds very interesting. Can this be done so you still have the feeling that you are working on youre one "home" wikipedia? Just like it is now, every wikipedia whit its one face, style, policys and url? Different Wikipedias who are living together because it is more practical but are still different wikipedias? Giskart 23:39 Oct 16, 2002 (UTC)
I'm not a developer (more specifically I'm not Brion) but I do know a thing or two about databases so what I say above is based on that knowledge. There is no technical reason I can think of why each language wouldn't by default look and act the way it does now. Under the 'one database, multiple languages' plan however, users would be able to set their own language preferences in many different ways.
So the only people who will see weird things like an Esperanto interface for French articles or an English Recent Changes with English, Italian and Japanese edits in it will be users who set-up their preferences to do that. Having the ability to set separate interface language preferences will probably be more useful for Metapedia though. As is it, Metapedia is beginning to be multi-lingual but the interface is set only to English. It therefore would be nice to give users the option of changing that.
There could also be language tags placed in URLs to set the language interface for people who are not logged-in or for people who have not explicitly set a language preference for Metapedia. For example: clicking on http://meta.wikipedia.org/&lang=fr could load the French user interface, and take the user to http://meta.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accueil (http://meta.wikipedia.org/&lang=fr would be the link to Metapedia you might have from the French Recent Changes). So for that person for that browser session, it would look like the default language of Metapedia was French and not English. There would have to be a quick note to visitors warning them that they should log-in and set their user preferences in order to keep the French interface beyond their current browser session though. Alternatively, a cookie could be downloaded automatically when somebody clicks on http://meta.wikipedia.org/&lang=fr and that would keep the language settings across different browser sessions. But some people think

automatically downloaded cookies are evil and may not like this idea. How this works for any particular language could be another thing the different language communities could decide for themselves. --Maveric149

Today (2002-10-17) there are problemes whit the English wikipedia. It can not be used. Al the others still work, so far i know. If it where one system all wikipedias whout be down i think. That is also somthing to take in to account. Giskart 11:30 Oct 17, 2002 (UTC)


Neil's proposal

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I feel strongly, about this detail: the "front page" of any website should lead directly to content: that is to say, an encyclopedia page. There should be an as-short-as-possible welcome banner at the top, perhaps with a pull-down menu of languages, that will change the language of the "front page", banner and all, to be any of the desired languages. There should also be a link to a "portal page", as described in Mav's proposal, easily visible in the banner.

Then the front page for that given language leads directly into the content of the particular language wikipedia.

The language of the banner, and hence the rest of the page should be:

  • the language specified in the URL, whether in the format en.wikipedia.org or www.wikipedia.org/en
  • the language in the user's login cookie, if set
  • the language specified by the user's browser preferences
  • default to English if www.wikipedia.org/com is used, and the language cannot be detected in any other way, on the basis that English is the lingua franca of the net

The layout could be something like:


Welcome to Wikipedia, a collaborative project to produce a complete encyclopedia in every language. This is the wikipedia: select your language to go to the Wikipedia in your language.

Language: {{pull down menu}}

Anyone, including /you/, can edit any article right now, without even having to log in. You can copyedit, expand an article, write a little or write a lot. See the Wikipedia FAQ for more background information about the project, and the help page for information on how to use and contribute to Wikipedia.


We could also be cute, and

  • if we can detect, for example, a user with Greek browser settings viewing the en.wikipedia.org page, add an extra bit of text to the UI saying in Greek "Welcome! Wikipedia is also available in the Greek language" with the links being to the appropriate pages in the Greek Wikipedia.
  • We could even add the portal prompt in random languages even when we can't guess the language, so an Urdu user browsing the English wiki with an English browser from the US will -- sooner or later -- see their language prompt.

So, think of this as a "portal header" for the front page, and a "portal prompt" added to all content.

We could also use the language guessed from the user's IP address, based on analysis of other users' logins and the fact that the public Internet does not in general route anything smaller than a /19 (a block of 8192 addresses). Of course, this is a poor way of doing things, given that language != ISP != nation != nationality, but it's better than a totally random guess: perhaps in this case we should use the guessed language for the "portal prompt" half the time, and a random one the rest.

A good idea would be to make a score for each language. Asuming someone is using Opera 7.0 in Romanian and his IP traces to the US, it should give a sorted list with wikipedias (and welcomes) in:
* Romanian - because of the language of the browser
* English - because of the country (US)
* Spanish - major minority in the US
and obviously smaller list with all wikipedias. I think it can be found some source code that restricts the IP to a city/region, so if someone from Basque Country enters this site should get the welcome in both Basque and Spanish.

193.231.116.73 17:37, 9 Nov 2003 (UTC)

I'm in favor of the language selection bar, and the defaulting to English unless a cookie is present. The question arises, obviously, of what should be done in the case of multiple cookies. As to the browser's language preference, I'm slightly opposed, and I'm willing to stare-until-uncomfortable at all who suggest IP detection. IP detection is evil. Google, a casual wiseguy, set an automatic redirect to one's local Google from Google.com, unless a cookie is present telling it otherwise. The reason that Google does this is that Google's cookies are used for spying on its users, and it thus benefits from forcing users to enable them. Google, in short, is Evil. Anyway, IP detection is inherently evil, and the country in which I dwell is of no interest to anybody. Besides, Itaitupia does not offer much in the way of IPs. -- Itai 00:46, 8 Mar 2004 (UTC)


I implemented Mav's proposal in HTML, it can be found at http://www.djini.de/Uploads/wikipedia/wikipedia.html and without images: http://www.djini.de/Uploads/wikipedia/wikipedia2.html - comments welcome. --Elian


I think it is a good attempt but that it must be more somthing like this http://europa.eu No long explenation about what the project is. If the can read on the front that this is Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia, that is enough. Wikipedia = the name/brand, Free = is a postief word. It draw the attention and it is not a lie. Encyclopaedia = what we actual are/do. More must it no be. Al the other information can be found on the wikipedias. Keep it clean and simple. Giskart 19:53 Oct 24, 2002 (UTC)
The table is great. I agree with Giskart, keep the text above to a minimum. Maybe add "the free enclypedia" in each table entry, in the different languages. -- tarquin
The second version (wikipedia2.html) has now a slightly shortened welcome message. If anyone can give me an even shorter text, I'll put up a new version so people can vote on it. Adding "free encyclopedia" to every entry is maybe not so good an idea, because we have to keep in mind that there will eventually be more languages added when more projects get active. Furthermore, the words free and encyclopedia are possibly understood by all people even if they speak no english at all, just done a test with my father ;-) --Elian

Fonzy's idea:

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I believe the simplest way is this, most ppl will realsie tehy ahve to select the language they want.


WIKIPEDIA language1 - language2 - language3 - language4 - language5 - language6 - language7 - language8 - language9 - language10 - language11 - language12 - language13 - language14 - language15 - language16 - language17 - language18 - language19 - language20 - language21 - language22 - language23 - language24 - language25 - language26 - language27 - language28 - language29 - language30 - language31 - language32 - language33 - language34 - language35 - language36 - language37 - language38 - language39 - language40 - language41 - language42 - language43 - language44 - language45 - language46 - language47 - language48 - language49 - language50 - language51 - language52 - language53 - language54 - language55 - language56 - etc


It is a possibility. But I am not sure it will look good when there are 30 or 40 languages. When there are only a few it works. See http://www.wikipedia.be and http://www.wikipedia.nl If you make of the portal a Wiki-portal there not a lot options. It will be something like this. If it is a static normal website, it can be anything. Be it must have a "Wikipedia look". A good example how it can be done is http://dmoz.org , http://europa.eu , http://esperanto.net Giskart 22:57 Jan 13, 2003 (UTC)

Kowey's synthesis

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  1. Things should be simple, low-tech and breakage free.
  2. We can combine Fonzy's idea with the simple design above by having about 3 big links for the major wikipedias, and small links for the rest.
  3. The choice of big links depends strictly on the size of their wikipedias. Maybe this will even spur a little friendly competetion. I personally hope to see zh and es outpace en!
  4. Ancient links to www.wikipedia.org can be handled with an intelligently designed 404 page?

See What to do with www.wikipedia.org/Proposal kowey

Provisional

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Provisional is Best, Sort by Population

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?Saludos! First of all, I request excuses by my terrible English, but I am proving to see as it translates google jeje.

I believe that slowly it is obtained a satisfactory option (within the difficulty to integrate so many languages in the cover). So far, the last one seems to me best http://meta.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_provisional_portal_of_Wikipedia, although I suppose that still it has to improve enough.

It seems to me correct, for example, that the introduction messages (subtitle of wikipedia, welcome and the mention to the encyclopedia development in different languages) come only in the languages from wikipedias with greater number of articles, and the rest of languages is including in a common listing on the footer, by alphabetic and democratic order. Thus much is not overloaded the page.

Anyway, I also consider if it would not be better than instead of prioritizing the languages of wikipedias with greater number of articles, stood out the languages more spoken by the humans. In due course, wikipedias in these lenguaje will be developed. If we are going to avoid a anglocentric encyclopedia, we avoid a eurocentric already, and we make the things good from the begining. According to one it lists that I have found in Internet, the more spoken languages would be:

  • Mandarin Chinese
  • English
  • Hindi
  • Spanish
  • Russian
  • Arabic
  • Bengali
  • Portuguese
  • Malay
  • Japanese

Of course, everything with the characters of its respective languages. To content to French and German (these country could cause that third world war). I would increase the list to 12, and would include after the Japanese:

  • French
  • German

Outside jokes, the french an german wikipedias is more developed than the one of hindi or Arab.

Also it seems to me that behind the name of each language, is does not have to go "An English available Wikipedia also. See http://en.wikipedia.org " since he is a little reiterative. There he is better to indicate the antique of the version in that language and the number of articles that contains in the style of the introduction of wikipedia English (and EL): "We started on 15 January 2001 and are already working on 99513 articles in the English version"

JARodr?guezY??ez, viajando por el mundo. 19/01/2003

PS: Hum, I had not seen enough What to do with www.wikipedia.org-mav's Prop.

Provisional is Ugly

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This is just me personally, but I find the provisional portal extremely ugly. As of me writing this note, and following the information at http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Complete_list_of_language_wikis_available , there are 34 Wikipedias with at least some text on the homepage in the respective language. Trying to allow for all that information in those languages could get messy. Surely, a clear system, such as can be seen at http://europa.eu or http://esperanto.net , where the minimum sufficient amount of text is displayed, would more pleasing to the eye and attractive to new users? --- Kwekubo

I agree complete. The provisional portal of Wikipedia is ugly. I have made that page :-) The thing is that there has been a lot of talk about "a protal" and "www.wikipedia.org" over a very long time period, first at the end of 2001. But no action. So I have made the "provisional portal" in november 2002 to have a page to send traffic to. That it is not good and ugly is normal. It is "provisional" for something. Giskart Walter 17:55 9 Jun 2003 (UTC)

I suggest a page of the same structure as the existing one (the bars marking off the top and left, the picture in the top corner etc.), but with text only in the main area of the page. That would at least give it more of a uniform Wikipedia feel. Any comments? --- Kwekubo

Automatic Redirect

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The user in www.wikipedia.org would be redirected automatically to his/her language wikipedia frontpage.

In example, an user with spanish like primary language would be redirected to es.wikipedia.org

All the frontpages would have the same content, but in different languages, similarlty to nowadays. There would be links to another language wikipedias ( french, english and so on ).

If the user´s language it´s not detected, the user would be redirected to en.wikipedia.org

Another possible solution for this user it´s include an automatic translator in a lot of languages, indicating to the user that s/he can use it to translate aumatically the english frontpage to his/her language.

User:Mac

I think that would suck. My default language is in my system Swedish, but I do most of my contributions to the english wikipedia, and has done edits in german and norwegian too. An international frontpage is my preference Sverdrup 02:22, 7 Dec 2003 (UTC)

Summary

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A new summary of options, examples, requirements, pros, and cons. Includes previous votes.

0. Keep the www. site English (Eng).

  • Req. thick skins.
  • - Eng bias which is out of step with where the Internet is moving.
  • + Easy.
  • + Gives a decent sized intro in the current lingua franca.
  • + One click for certain Eng articles.

1. Move Eng pages to en., and meta. to en.meta..

  • Req. people with technical know-how to volunteer.
  • Req. www..org/foo and www..com/foo; and meta..com/foo to forward to en..org/foo; and en.meta..com/foo, except where foo is index.html.
  • Req. suggested designs.
  • - New Eng speakers must now click twice before being able to read encyclopedic articles, like users of othe languages.
  • - Still has Latin and Eng bias with abbr.s: http, www, pedia, org, and com.
  • + Removes some Engl bias.
  • 1.01. Keep intro text on www. Engl.
    • - Still has most of the Eng bias.
  • 1.02. Have only short message (160 chars?) of all available langs.
  • 1.03. Have intro paragraphs for all langs.
    • - Unwieldy.
  • 1.04. Have intro paragraphs for the most active langs, links to other langs.
    • - Unwieldy.
    • - Access bias.
  • 1.05. Detect primary browser language, and redirect to that lang's subdomain.
  • 1.06. Have a search box with a drop down language list.
  • 1.07. Sort by 2 letter lang code.
  • 1.08. Sort by busiest langues.
    • - Access bias.
    • - Makes it very hard to find what you're looking for.
  • 1.09. Alphabetize by lang name in lang.
    • - Latin bias.
  • 1.10. Sort by most speakers in the world.
    • - Populum bias.
    • - Makes it very hard to find what you're looking for.
  • 1.11. Have only links, with only language names.
    • E.g.: Fonzy's.
  • 1.12. Have only short message (50 chars?) of busy langs, links to all langs with only lang name.
  • 1.13. ?

2. Keep Eng but redirect to browser lang.

  • - English bias.

3. ?

Straw poll (not an election) votes:

0. (2) Philippe (interim), MyRedDice (22 Apr 2003)


1. (23) Kpjas (2002-10-26), Martin Aggel (Oct 26, 2002), ottsch (2002-11-04), Tarquin (Jan 13, 2003, highlight browser language settings), Maveric149 (Jan 13, 2003, wait for a multilingual phase IV for portal though move to en., until then browser lang detect, else default to Eng), Giskart (Jan 13, 2003), Youandme (Jan 14, 2003), Youssefsan (Jan 18, 2003, + Tarquin's prop to help with EL and Es), Camembert (Jan 18, 2003), Magnus Manske (Jan 18, 2003, Phase IV not there for a long time, do now and somehoe reuse?), Med (Jan 18, 2003), AstroNomer (Jan 18, 2003, + Tarquin's), Yann (Jan 18, 2003, + tarquin's), Calo (+ Tarquin), Toby (Jan 21, 2003, + mav), Chuck SMITH (+ Tarquin), Aoineko (also see my other idea), Jbdayez (+ Tarquin), iNyar (Suggestion with highlight and welcome language auto-detected), Traroth (Jun 13, 2003), Lénaïc, I am Jack's username (2003-07-06), Kwekubo (2 Sep, 2003)

  • 1.06. (0)
  • 1.06.1. (0)
  • 1.06.2. (0)
  • 1.07. (0)
  • 1.08. (0)
  • 1.09. (1) I am Jack's username (2003-07-06, disclaimer: af.),
  • 1.10. (0)
  • 1.11. (1) Kwekubo (2 Sep, 2003)
  • 1.12. (0)

2. (5) Erik Moeller (Oct 27, 2002), Maveric149 (Jan 13, 2003, interim, see above), Buf (Jan 18, 2003), MyRedDice (22 Apr 2003, interlanguage links at top expanded), LittleDan,

Voting

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this message is crossposted to intlwiki-l and wikipedia-l and to metawikipedia

Most arguments in favor or against different solutions seem to have been presented now, but I must say I lost track who wants what. Furthermore it's a useless waste of energy to work on different solutions without knowing which is wanted.

So I invite people to give their vote..

www.wikipedia.org should:

() not be changed at all.

  1. Philippe, as an interim solution, on the condition that this is a straw poll, not an election
  2. MyRedDice 10:15 22 Apr 2003 (UTC)
  3. Itai 15:14, 13 Mar 2004 (UTC) - usefulness should usually come first

() redirect depending on the browser's language setting to the wikipedia in the prefered language.

  1. Erik Moeller Oct 27, 2002
  2. Maveric149 18:39 Jan 13, 2003 (UTC) As an interim solution - yes. But see below.
  3. Buf 16:09 Jan 18, 2003 (UTC)
  4. MyRedDice 10:15 22 Apr 2003 (UTC) (on the condition that the interlanguage links at the top of en:Main Page, etc, are expanded)
  5. w:User:LittleDan Makes most sense. No one will accidentally change their browser's language settings, and for most people, it'll remain the same.
  6. mjec Makes lots of sense, that's why Accept-Language header exists. Quickest way in for all. Word "multilingual" in UN languages as link on all main pages?

() be a multilingual portal (1)

  1. Kpjas 2002-10-26
  2. Martin Aggel 15:53 Oct 26, 2002 (UTC)
  3. ottsch 2002-11-04
  4. Tarquin 14:36 Jan 13, 2003 (UTC) , and use browser language settings to highlight the user's language
  5. Maveric149 18:39 Jan 13, 2003 (UTC) We should wait for a multilingual phase IV before having a multilingual "portal" though. Until then we could still move the English Wikipedia and have browser language sniffing to redirect people to the Wiki that corresponds to their browser language setting if that wiki is an active one - if not then they should be redirected to en.wiki.
  6. Giskart 20:23 Jan 13, 2003 (UTC)
  7. Youandme 04:35 Jan 14, 2003 (UTC)
  8. Youssefsan 01:05 Jan 18, 2003 (UTC)+ Tarquin's proposition I hope it will help the relations between EL and Spanish wiki
  9. Camembert 13:33 Jan 18, 2003 (UTC)
  10. Magnus Manske 13:38 Jan 18, 2003 (UTC) Phase IV won't be there for a long time, as far as I can see, and even if, why not do this now and somehoe reuse it later?
  11. Med 15:49 Jan 18, 2003 (UTC)
  12. AstroNomer 18:39 Jan 18, 2003 (UTC) + Tarquin's suggestion above.
  13. Yann 20:06 Jan 18, 2003 (UTC) and I agree with tarquin's proposal.
  14. Calo. I also agree with Tarquin.
  15. (on the condition that this is a straw poll, not an election) Toby 09:11 Jan 21, 2003 (UTC) -- mav has good design -- and a good point above.
  16. Chuck SMITH - agree with Tarquin
  17. Aoineko : also see my other idea
  18. Jbdayez : I agree with Tarquin's proposal.
  19. iNyar agree with the current project (with highlight and welcome message language auto-detected)
  20. Traroth Jun 13, 2003. It's the most simple and elegant solution
  21. Lénaïc : I can't see better solutions and it could be easily a very attractive portal
  22. Wolfram 05:12, 9 Nov 2003 (UTC)
  23. Kowey 09:26, 6 Dec 2003 (UTC) - use smart 404 for broken links
  24. Sverdrup 02:23, 7 Dec 2003 (UTC)

(1) draft to be further improved at http://mitglied.lycos.de/manske/wiki/test.php with language of the welcome message derived from the browser settings and prefered language highlighted. --ELian

() other:

  1. Crazy idea that may work for everybody: Have http://wikipedia.org (which currently redirects to www.wikipedia.org) be the multilanguage portal as discussed above but for backwards compatibility reasons have www.wikipedia.org (and www.wikipedia.com) redirect to http://wikipedia.org/en/Main_Page. Otherwise we really are breaking many thousands of links that already intend to go to the English Wikipedia. The more I think about it, the more this seems to be important. --Maveric149 08:16 Jan 23, 2003 (UTC)
  2. If the browser's language setting is english, redirect en.wikipedia.org otherwise show a multilingual portal at www.wikipedia.org. Aoineko
    • I really like this idea. This is not at all complicated and preserves thousands of direct links that already point to the English Wikipedia. We could then change the second link on the en.wiki Main Page that says "multilingual" to link to the portal. --Maveric149
  3. Interesting compromise, and certainly better than doing nothing, but afaik there's a lot of people around the world who have browser's that are set to English and don't know how to change it. --Chuck SMITH

Maybe for langauges that have not been started on the main page say welcome to wikipedia blah blah your language has not yet been started so go ahead start your language wikipedia (or something liek that) in their language of course. - fonzy

http://www.wikipedia.info/

edit

(sorry, kinda off-topic ...) hi, can we add the great portal page we have for wikipedia.org for wikipedia.info now? I think http://www.wikipedia.info/ is a great address and should have this portal, too ... --Magglz 23:20, 20 Feb 2005 (UTC)

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