User blog comment:Susanolivia/Fixed Width, Sidebar, and the Removal of Monaco/@comment-1291946-20101003024624

I'm sorry, but I still think this is the wrong move.

One of the critical flaws of Oasis, and one that hasn't received as much attention as it should, is that it is much harder to customise. "Unity" across Wikia isn't a valid reason to deny individuality among wikis. One of the reasons that Oasis isn't customisable is because the positions of most elements are hard-coded. This makes it very difficult to change the interface, because you can't just add something to a list as you could previously.

Another problem with Oasis is the fact that many of the common tools have been moved. In my opinion, Oasis is far less intuitive than Monaco was. Ideally, we would still have a bar across the top with Edit, Watch, History, etc. on it. It's simply easier to use, and easier to modify for any additional features, as mentioned above.

In short, although Oasis may look pretty (and only after you remove the awful WikiaRail), it's simply not as functional as Monaco was, and it would take a major redesign in order to work efficiently.

However, I also recognise that maintaining Monaco and Oasis is difficult. Why not simply do this: Keep Monaco, but don't continue to maintain and update it. The lack of new features won't be a problem for those who really want Monaco, just as it isn't a problem for those using Monobook. I would certainly give up new features in exchange for continued use of a skin which I find intuitive and effective.