Don't worry, they've also removed the ability to switch to other languages on the normal Wikipedia.
The sidebar shows some major languages (German, Hindi etc), but not the ones I'm trying to learn. Clicking the "more" button then has the most ridiculous UI ever: "Suggested languages"! What is the point of suggesting Yiddish to me?!
It has already taken multiple clicks for users wanting to read English Wikipedia in a language that wasn't one of the nine in the sidebar. In fact, clicking the "287 more" link at the bottom of the left sidebar in the old design brought up the exact same box that clicking the "297 languages" link at the top of the new design does, with the same list of languages in the same order.
Alternatively, one could create an account and set a default language, or visit a wikipedia site dedicated to that language.
Well, it's secret on mobile. I had the same problem - I wanted to switch languages on mobile wikipedia, but the page appears to provide no way to do that. Functionality that has been carefully designed so you won't find it isn't really an improvement over functionality that isn't there.
I look at the different language wikis all the time for that reason (and because I'm a native Spanish speaker who prefers the English Wikipedia), but it's just routine to scroll to the language selection list completely ignoring the controls of the left pane, that I may have used twice in the last 10 years merely out of curiosity.
Not only was there more diverse content when learning (though for that I can at least recommend Clozemaster), but now that some part of my mobile experience keeps defaulting to showing me wikipedia in German[0], I keep realising how out of sync the different languages of wikipedia are.
[0] a bit of a tangent from the article, but it's been irritating me for ages now.
I'm in Germany, but English is the top entry in Settings.app Preferred Languages, and I'm using iOS 16: highlight a word, e.g. "German"; in the context menu select «Look Up»; this text is all correctly in English; tap either the title or in the links list the wikipedia link; what do I get?
> I think the challenge with the language icon is 1) there are not many multilingual sites and 2) the other icons there potentially cause the user to ignore them entirely.
Multilingual sites aren't rare at all. There is a conventional way to display a language selector: it's a button (usually a dropdown menu, if you click on it) with a national flag and the name of the language.
The big problem on mobile wikipedia is that wikipedia already has a well-established way to select the language you want to see the article in, and the mobile site completely removes it.
What I don’t like that how they put the languages of the article behind a drop down menu button.
Personally I find the available languages are a good indicator about the “reach” of the article.
In the previous design it was just a glance on the sidebar to see if translations are available or not. Now I have to click and sometimes even scroll too if I want to see all languages.
That doesn't help you figure out where to go to change the setting, unless you want to list all the available language options at the top of every single page.
It's hilarious from the start - first thing they do is throw out the logo that incorporates multiple languages and says 'fuck you, we're going English for Wiki'. They compound this by then making all the various logos English-derived, so these guys have basically shouted to the world that they don't grasp the basics of their client.
They even propose a feature that shows everyone how much English dominates the other languages in other languages, being the colour bar. And if you want something not in English, you have to find the nigh-undiscoverable 'roll over top right corner' to have the language selecter appear. They're pushing really hard to make non-English users feel like second-class citizens.
Then they redesign the page to make content harder to get to by putting a giant damn banner at the top of every page. Literally a third of the page is the banner. It's a wonder they didn't suggest putting some 'subtle' advertising in or something.
This redesign literally made be laugh out loud several times. My main regret is that I don't have a marketing budget, because then I could ensure these jokers would never get any of it.
geizhals.eu is in fact not in english (I never visited it before and it shows in German by default). I can't immediately find a language selector. I don't have german in my preferred languages browser setting.
If a user doesn't recognise the word "English" then they are not going to have any idea what language select. The reason the languages are all listed on the page without any interaction needed is so someone can look at the webpage and recognise their language and select it without having to understand anything else. How do I access the main page of a wiki?
This isn't redefined, it's just a redesign with some bad, some good, aesthetic changes.
Before you got the drop down on the front page that you now see on repl.it/languages. I admit I didn't look too hard at the list of languages that are there now, but just that one change to sign up instead of dive into the repl was a little annoying.
Clearly designed by someone who only uses one language.
The one most used element for me was the side bar, where I could hover over the language to see the translation of some term. Now it's hidden behind a click, and a looot of scrolling. Just try to reach Svenska.
I can work around the style changes easily with custom CSS and stylus, but I'm not impressed by that change.
There is a language toggle button in the bottom right corner, but at least on my mobile device it is entirely obscured by the cookie disclosure button. And worse, the search seems entirely broken if you switch the site to English- I got no results searching eg. for everything in the "Painting" category.
You've been able to enable this in your account preferences for a while now, and it's also been the default on non-English versions of Wikipedia for a while as well.
Wow I really don't like the (automatic?) translation I'm hit with. Sure I know that language, but English is fine? At least give me the option to shut it off or make it opt-in.
It's kind of ironic to make this design mistake on a site dedicated to raise awareness about design decisions
The sidebar shows some major languages (German, Hindi etc), but not the ones I'm trying to learn. Clicking the "more" button then has the most ridiculous UI ever: "Suggested languages"! What is the point of suggesting Yiddish to me?!
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