Wikipedia is getting its first desktop redesign in 10 years

Ah, good that you located that toggle button.

Perhaps I'm overlooking those Preferences > Appearance > Skin Preferences > (uncheck) Enable limited width mode.
Where on Wikipedia pages do you see those Preferences?

 

You have to be logged in first, they don't appear if you are not logged in to Wikipedia. At the top right corner of the screen, hit the drop down menu under your profile and hit "Preferences". The second tab is "Appearance" and you will find that relevant setting there.

 

Ah, thanks, that explains why I didn't see those preferences.
I wasn't logged in, as I don't have a Wikipedia account.
I have seen the heated arguments, that's not for me, life's too short to be a Wikipedia contributor.

 

Same here. I was a regular contributor on Wikipedia about 10 years ago, but stopped because of these editing wars and arguments, in which the person who has no life and spends their entire day in front of a computer usually wins. I just did not want to waste my time. Nowadays I just make about 10 edits a year, usually spelling mistakes and typos.

Login also gives me the ability to customize Wikipedia to my liking, and I can also uncheck most of the banners in preferences, otherwise these banners can drive you mad.

 

How to restore Wikipedia's old design
By Ashwin - January 25, 2023

 

I think this might be the case, I have no idea how this is possible. I'm still not happy with the new look, because am I now supposed to hide the sidebar with each and every article? And I don't feel like having to login. Wikipedia should be ashamed for making such a mess.

 

Neither am i. The new look could be tolerable but from what i experienced it's not very user friendly at all.
Looks scattered now- sigh

 

The sidebar is too wide for my liking and cannot be permanently hidden. Most likely because they added the TOC (table of contents) to the sidebar, so it comes back every time you go to a new article. They just need to tweak the new design to make the sidebar the same width as before, or add the option to permanently hide the sidebar and move the table of contents back to their old location.

There is already a heated discussion going on at this page about the new look, you can add your concerns to the mix
https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Talk:Reading/Web/Desktop_Improvements

 

Yes, this stuf is so annoying. They also redesigned imdb.com last year, it now looks a bit crappy and even worse, it's way slower to load. There are too many untalented people employed in web development, that's for sure.

 

BTW, I noticed that it also differs per article. On the first two articles I don't see the sidebar, but I do seem them on the 3th and 4th link.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AppLovin
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingsoft
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pinterest
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HP_Autonomy

 

This is because the first two articles don't have a TOC (table of contents). On Wikipedia, an article needs to have more than three section headings for a TOC to auto generate. The author of the article can force a TOC to generate by placing __FORCETOC__ anywhere in the article, but most people don't bother.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Help:Section
https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:Table_of_contents

 

Yes, they should really give an option to autohide the TOC, also when you're not logged in.

 

I agree, but I don't think they are going to change anything because a thing like this usually happens when there is no competition, and the developers know that consumers will use whatever they design, as consumers don't have a choice. So, just like Microsoft develops software for themselves, and expect consumers to either use it as is or get lost, Wikipedia's developers have designed this new style just for themselves.

 

Yes, the old design was better. Luckily they haven't made the switch yet on the Dutch Wikipedia pages. I also complained about IMDB being to slow, but as usual the response was that they don't really see a big problem, but at least they said they will try to improve it with client side rendering, which I doubt will solve anything.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Will_Smith
https://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Will_Smith_(acteur)