Board Thread:General Discussion/@comment-26923519-20170904070335

Hey guys, JustLeafy here. If you thought this was a topic from the FANDOM staff, no, it's not. Today, I would like to discuss a topic with you guys. What are your thoughts about wiki modernization? Is it good for wikis or no? Lemme share my opinions.

Opinions about the current products
Featured Videos: While this isn't introduced in most wikis (yet), it does seem like a nice way to receive additional information. It also reduces even more ads, which is good. Autoplay is automatically disabled in most cases, so that's a plus. The only disadvantage is that it isn't separated from the article. I did invent a smart way to separate the video from the article. See here, for example. The video is actually a normal video, though.

Page and Article Headers: The design is very neat and good looking. TBH, I wouldn't really complain about the double title, because it is possible to remove it + it can be a slogan instead. The only disadvantage with it (which is a pretty big disadvantage, IMO) is the fact that we are limited from customizing the header(s) in general. Sure, the good thing is that we can now customize it a bit from Theme Designer (which makes the tool even more useful), but I don't like the fact that we can't customize it with CSS/JS. I know they may look inconsistent, but they can actually prove a variety of customization, and how creative the header customization makers are. At least we can still customize them in personal CSS/JS.

Right Rail Modules: While the re-design is mainly cosmetic, they do look pretty neat, as I can say. I didn't really look how the TFA module had a delay for full modernization, but it's okay, since it is modernized now, anyways. The rest of the modules need modernization, but I wouldn't consider that as a disadvantage, because the FANDOM staff are gonna do that soon.

Fan Feed: From an annoying footer that people loved hiding into a cleaner and more modern looking footer, it looks much better, as I can say. I do like how the wiki's content (and even (relevant) content from other wiki) are mixed up with news and stories, Discussions, Explore Wikis and Read More cards, despite the Games and Thrones cards dominating over the footer (it's not a big problem, anyway, because there will be less topic cards about GoT soon, once the topics become less trending). The only disadvantage, IMO, is the fact that it is at least 2000 pixels long. The FANDOM staff should remove 2 rows of fan feed cards, or just make it scrollable.

News & Stories do not count, since they are not part of a wiki.

Features that need modernization
There are a few other features that need modernizing.

Table of Contents: From the start, the Table of Contents did not look modern, looked ugly and added too much whitespace. To modernize the ToC, it should look almost the same as the ToC in here.

Components: All square avatars, buttons with gradients and border radius, old dropdowns, old icons, old lists, loading throbbers and old tabs should have the newer versions, which are found here.

New Features needed for Wiki Modernization
There are some features that exist in a few wikis, which indicate modernization for wikis

New Categorization: This feature consists of additional buttons and other features, to make category browsing much easier. An example can be found here. It includes:
 * An extra article header, to include the following:
 * Number of pages in a specific category.
 * A button that leads into a random article in a specific category.
 * A Layout Guide button, which indicates a layout of a specific category. There should be an option to hide it, though.
 * Subcategories displayed in a modern way (not like in the example, but they should look like the Fan Feed topic cards).
 * If a description was added, a "Description" heading will automatically appear.

JQuery Sliders: If you don't know what JQuery Sliders are, they are navigation sliders displayed in a curated and modern way. They shouldn't replace the older sliders, since those sliders function differently. An example of a JQuery slider can be found here. These sliders should only appear in the main page, and they can be optionally added in the main page.

Dark Theme: Dark Theme is the ability to switch the contrast of a wiki from white to black and vice-versa. This improves the experience of readers at night.

Lemme know your thoughts, guys! You can also discuss about what I said should be modernized, if you want to. 