View source for Wikipedia:Easy navigation

{{historical}}
{|align="center"
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|align="center"|''Working title'' for this guideline proposal: '''Easy navigation''', other possibilities discussed on the [[Wikipedia talk:Easy navigation|talk page]]
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|align="center"|'''[[WP:ENAV]]''' has been proposed as a shortcut to this proposed guideline, other possibilities discussed on the [[Wikipedia talk:Easy navigation|talk page]]
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The intent of this guideline is to give a helicopter view on the different techniques that help users to navigate through the content of Wikipedia, in its capacity of web browser application, ''as swiftly <!-- see correction by Lupin, 11 october 2005 - not having a really satisfactory solution yet, I put the "silly" word swiftly for the time being, as it is not only about "speed" as expressed by "rapidly", the connotation is also "carefree", "not cumbersome"--> as possible''.

Wikipedia aims at ''completeness'', that is: covering all knowledge that meets its criteria. As the content of the wikipedia encyclopedia increases (which is a good thing!) navigation becomes increasingly complex. This may hamper swift navigation as users, for example, may  have to work through several disambiguation pages listing remote topics before finally reaching the desired page. So the natural "counterpart" of this guideline would be [[wikipedia:coverage]], shortcut [[WP:COV]]{{ref|V1}}. "Counterpart" does not mean that these two guidelines would be actually ''opposed'' to one another: it's more of a collaboration. Each one completes the other, as [[wikipedia:naming conventions (common names)]] and [[wikipedia:naming conventions (precision)]] are each other's complement.

That distinction being made, this present "easy navigation" guideline deals with:
*'''[[wikipedia:naming conventions|naming conventions]]''' rather than with [[Wikipedia:The perfect article|the content of an article]]
*'''[[Wikipedia:Categories, lists, and series boxes|techniques for the grouping of articles]]''' rather than with [[Wikipedia:Manual of Style (biographies)|the internal structure of a biography article]]
*'''Wikipedia as a competitor to other ''on-line'' encyclopedias''', rather than with wikipedia as a competitor to ''printed'' encyclopedias{{ref|JimboSD}}
*etc...

In short the topic of this guideline is: how does one "hop" to an article in the swiftest way.

The basic principle (''rule of thumb'') of this guideline is:
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|align="center"|'''page names deal with ''navigation'''''
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|align="center"|and
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|align="center"|'''article content deals with ''coverage'''''
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The remainder of this guideline is a consideration of how this principle can be implemented with maximum effect and also what happens when and where the "navigation" and "coverage" principles intersect (typically "disambiguation" pages, which are in essence "content" pages primarily listing "page names"). Further, this guideline describes how Wikipedia is part of this massive navigation system called the internet.

==Subject of this guideline==
===Definitions of terms===
'''Information path''' refers, generally, to a link or series of links which the user must follow to get from article ''A'' to article ''B''.  Information paths include wikilinks, lists, categories, navigation templates, redirects, "See also" sections, "External links" sections, and disambiguation pages.  They also may include references within articles, both to other websites and to paper documents, and "Further reading" sections.

'''Information flow''' refers to the amount of ''useful'' information made available to the user through navigable information paths.

===Purpose and goals===
The general purposes of this proposal are to shorten information paths and increase information flow, wherever possible.  This requires:
# A consistency in terms of appearance, placement, functionality, and content (or content type) across elements wherever possible.
# Optimizing information paths to increase navigability and ease of use.
# Anticipating and responding to ways in which users may want to navigate Wikipedia and what information paths may be the most useful to the users.
# Considering the impact and usefulness of different ways to link to other wiki projects such as Wikitionary and Wiki Quotes.

==Wikipedia and navigation==
One of the angles of getting started with this "Easy navigation" guideline was the issue of ''categories''. There has been a lot of talk about them being politically oriented (which they sometimes are), but the only proposal usually is to delete them - which doesn't fix the problem, since the deletion is itself politically oriented.

Changing the way we think about these things may help to fix the problem.  If we look at categories, for example, as ways to facilitate the users getting the information they want, and try to anticipate possible information paths, while restricting ourselves exclusively to that activity (not ''exclusively'' exclusively, but when we're doing information-path oriented categorization), we can maybe push through some of the problem areas in a more NPOV manner.  

Likewise lists, redirects, and so on.  This defines the main topic of this section: '''''how contributors can increase the flow of information the user wants.''''' Categorization schemes, new ways to use lists and redirects and disambiguation pages, even new ways to write articles can be considered from that perspective.

An overview of the ''ways'' to navigate in wikipedia includes:
#Links - see [[wikipedia:links]]
#Article titles - see [[wikipedia:naming conventions]]
#Disambiguation pages - see [[wikipedia:disambiguation]]
#Lists - see [[wikipedia:lists]]
#Categories - see [[wikipedia:categories]]
#Redirects - see [[wikipedia:redirects]]
#Templates - see [[wikipedia:navigational templates]]

Some of these navigation tools are discussed in the sections below, from this perspective of how they can '''''facilitate information flow'''''

===Links===
...

===Redirects===
...

===Lists===
...

===Categories===
...

===Disambiguation pages===
{| class="toccolours" align= "right" width= "50%" style="clear: both; margin: 0.5em 2em;"
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! bgcolor="#ccccff" | '''"La Reine Margot" example'''
|-
| '''''Queen Margot''''' ([[French language|French]] '''''La Reine Margot''''') was a [[novel]] written in [[1845]] by [[Alexandre Dumas, père]].

It is the fictionalized story of the real [[Marguerite de Valois]], wife of King [[Henry IV of France]].

Several movies were based on the novel, including:
* ''[[La Reine Margot (1910 film)]]''
* ''[[La Reine Margot (1954 film)]]''
* ''[[La Reine Margot (1994 film)]]'', a [[1994]] film starring [[Isabelle Adjani]] and [[Daniel Auteuil]]. The film was nominated for the [[Academy Award for Costume Design]].

;External links
*{{gutenberg|no=13856|name=La reine Margot &mdash; Tome I}} ([[French language|French]])
*{{gutenberg|no=13857|name=La reine Margot &mdash; Tome II}} ([[French language|French]])

<div class="boilerplate metadata" id="stub"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="background-color: transparent;"><tr ><td >[[Image:Books-aj.svg aj ashton 01.svg|35px| ]]</td ><td >''&nbsp;This [[book]]-related article is a [[Wikipedia:Perfect stub article|stub]].  You can [[Wikipedia:Find or fix a stub|help]] Wikipedia by [{{fullurl:{{FULLPAGENAME}}|action=edit}} expanding it]''.</td ></tr ></table ></div >

<div class="boilerplate metadata" id="stub"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="background-color: transparent;"><tr><td>[[Image:Film reel.svg|30px| ]]</td><td>''&nbsp;This [[film]]-related article is a [[Wikipedia:Perfect stub article|stub]].  You can [[Wikipedia:Find or fix a stub|help]] Wikipedia by [{{fullurl:{{FULLPAGENAME}}|action=edit}} expanding it].''</td></tr></table></div>

[[:Category:Book stubs]]
[[:Category:Film stubs]]
[[:Category:1845 books]]
[[:Category:1994 films]]
[[:Category:French novels]]
[[:Category:Alexandre Dumas]]
|}

Making a good disambiguation page is an art as much as making any other wikipedia page. An example of how things can become a bit fuzzy: currently [[Queen Margot]] redirects to the page shown on the right as an example:

But what is this page? Is it a page about a queen named ''Marguerite''? Is it a page about a French book? About one or more ''movies''? Is it a ''stub''? None of these: it's a disambiguation page in disguise. It's not a "content" page lacking "content", it basically links to other pages, only it lacks the clear ''navigational'' structure of a disambiguation page. Giving it a clearer ''disambiguation page'' structure, differentiating between links that go to pages that could be titled "Queen Margot", and accessory links, would make it more effective as a navigational aid.{{ref|Dumas}}

Indeed, a ''disambiguation'' page is a type of page that is meant ''not'' to retain a users' attention: the quicker a user clicks away, the better. As it is said in the text of the template for disambiguation pages it is ''a navigational aid'' and thus, according to the maxim of this guideline, not a content page but a page that lets ''page names'' do their job as navigation stepstones. So highlighting these ''clickable'' page names, avoiding to draw attention to anything else that would be "clickable".

===Navigational templates===
Web usability research teaches that anything that looks like a "[[Web banner|banner]]", or is trying to attract too much attention on a webpage is perceived as publicity, and will thus be ignored (at best) or irritate and make the user leave the page. People accustomed to the Google interface will ignore anything that looks like a column of advertisements on the right of a screen.

For ''boilerplate'' templates on top of the page that's a good thing: users will immediately recognise the message ''in'' such box is no part of the content of the article itself (this is: will ''ignore'' the message), and will only come back to it if they experience "something isn't as it should be" when reading the content of the article.

Here is a discussion by examples of some ''types'' of navigational templates. As always, since templates ''borrow'' article space, (1) let the ''article names'' do the job, and, (2) limit the "borrowed" space:

====Upper right corner====
{{Postmodernism}}
For example take the [[Template:Postmodernism|Postmodernism template]] at right - note that this template links to the era "preceding" postmodernism. A small detail, but one that helps the user that wants to compare both approaches to society and art. Nonetheless the template is ''small'', ''factual'', mentioning diverse intriguing topics.

A less successful example is [[Template:S-C-G-B]] - this template is intended to be used on the pages of members of the Belgian royal family. It is too high to fit on a standard screen. Furthermore, as it is for use on pages of ''persons'' it usually conflicts with the upper right corner ''image'' of the person, so most of it is below the screen. For some of the members of this royal family, whose history can be told in about ''half'' a page, that amounts to bad lay-out with a lot of whitespace (example: [[Prince Charles of Belgium]]). The coat of arms displayed on top of the template is too big with its flashy colors to make people even look at it.

====Bottom of the page====
Example: [[Template:Symphonies by number and name]] - navigational aid across lists, disambiguation pages, categories and content pages: assists in quickly finding the encyclopedia article on whatever symphony you're looking for: no symphony article is more than two clicks away from a page that displays this template (for example: [[Symphonies by number]]).

A special type of bottom-of-the-page navigational templates are the ''incumbent series'' templates, for example, from [[James I of England]] (using the convoluted "two to three" succession box):

{{start box}}
{{s-bef|rows=2|before=[[Elizabeth I of England|Elizabeth I]]}}
{{s-ttl|title=[[List of British monarchs|King of England]]|years=1603-1625}}
{{s-aft|rows=3|after=[[Charles I of England|Charles I]]}}
{{s-ttl|title=[[King of Ireland]]|years=1603-1625}}
{{s-bef|before=[[Mary I of Scotland|Mary I]]}}
{{s-ttl|title=[[List of British monarchs|King of Scots]]|years=1567-1625}}
{{end box}}

Which could also be the following (using the newer [[Wikipedia:Incumbent series]] boxes):

{| border="1" align="center" style="border-collapse:collapse" width="65%"
| width="15%" align="center"| ''<small>Preceded by</small>''<br>'''[[Elizabeth I of England|Elizabeth I]]'''
| width="35%" bgcolor="#aaaaaa" align="center"| '''James I''', [[List of British monarchs|King of England]] and [[King of Ireland|Ireland]]<br>1603-1625
| width="15%" align="center"| ''<small>Succeeded by</small>''<br>'''[[Charles I of England|Charles I]]'''
|}
{| border="1" align="center" style="border-collapse:collapse" width="65%"
| width="15%" align="center"| ''<small>Preceded by</small>''<br>'''[[Mary I of Scotland|Mary I]]'''
| width="35%" bgcolor="#aaaaaa" align="center"| '''James VI''', [[List of British monarchs|King of Scots]]<br>1567-1625
| width="15%" align="center"| ''<small>Succeeded by</small>''<br>'''[[Charles I of England|Charles I]]'''
|}

...reducing height and redundant whitespace around the template, while nonetheless also mentioning the different name the monarch had in each realm (clarifying something that is too convoluted to communicate by the page name of the article on this monarch).

Note that such ''incumbent boxes'' are typically at the intersection of ''navigational'' and ''content'' characteristics of wikipedia:
*They are ''navigational'', so should not take too much room in "article space";
*They are ''content'', in that they can add some content and context that are withdrawn from the ''page name'' while that additional info would make the page name too long.

==Other navigational aids==
Navigational aids that only become ''operational'' in wikipedia when a user installs them include:
* [[Wikipedia:Tools/Navigation popups]]

==Notes==
# {{note|V1}} The [[Wikipedia:Pushing to 1.0|"Version 1.0" project]]/[[Wikipedia:Stable versions|"stable versions" proposal]] would probably presently come nearest to this ''coverage'' idea.
# {{note|JimboSD}} That Wikipedia can be seen as a competitor to other encyclopedias follows, for instance, from [http://interviews.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/07/28/1351230&tid=146&tid=95&tid=11 the 28 July 2004 interview Jimbo Wales gave to Slashdot]:<blockquote>Q3: ''Was wondering if you view the Wikipedia as a competitor or an additional tool compared to a World Book or an Encyclopedia Britannica?''</blockquote>To which [[Jimbo Wales]] replied:<blockquote>I would view them as a competitor [...]</blockquote>
# {{note|Dumas}} The intention of this example is not to have no page about [[Alexandre Dumas, père|Alexandre Dumas]]' "Reine Margot" book: on the contrary: it suggests to make separate pages: ''one'' for disambiguation, ''one'' about the book.