A week or so ago, I mentioned the possibility of page type presets that would expand the "new article" window beyond "default" and "blank" and give users the option to choose a variety of other pre-formatted page types. "Fan fiction page", "Video series page", "Comic page", etc. These pages would come pre-formatted with the most common elements of a given page type (like an appropriate infobox) and would also include some instructions on what to do and what not to do (such as: "External link" is not an optional section).
I had some time to look into that today, and it turns out it's not all that difficult to set up pages like this. In theory, there's a wikia extension that handles this elegantly, but apparently it was a rather flawed beta product when it was still available earlier this month, and in any case it's not available at the moment. I can ask wikia what happened to it, but I won't bother if people here are dead set against having the thing switched on (hence the forum thread).
I've already tested a more primitive way of achieving the same goal (test it yourself by switching the URL to point to your own sandbox), and it works, but it would require some fiddling to make it accessible to new and inexperienced users (which it is supposed to be for, after all). --Tulipclaymore 19:21, February 23, 2012 (UTC)
- Hmm... yeah, that's odd. I remember the Layout Builder being an option in the "Wiki Features" section of the admin dashboard, but it's not there anymore (I checked on both this wiki and the FiM wiki; I can only assume it's been removed wikia wide). I would be all for contacting wikia about it; making this wiki as accessible as possible: enabling people to write about their favorite FiMfics, or fan videos, even without having a lot of wiki editing experience, in my mind, can only be a good thing. I mean, there are so many great fics that don't even have a page here yet. -- This is Jonny Manz, signing off! 06:17, February 24, 2012 (UTC)
- I just heard back and it looks like we'll have to make do without the Layout Builder. I wrote a very early draft of a fanfic page preset; that's what it would look like with the preload method (except for the yellow box, obviously). I don't know how much time I'll have to work on it and similar pages, so I'll allow anyone reading this to either suggest changes here, or just make changes directly on the sandbox page. --Tulipclaymore 02:14, February 26, 2012 (UTC)
- Impressive. I don't have anything to add to it now, but if I ever think of anything, I will. -- This is Jonny Manz, signing off! 03:18, February 26, 2012 (UTC)
- I just heard back and it looks like we'll have to make do without the Layout Builder. I wrote a very early draft of a fanfic page preset; that's what it would look like with the preload method (except for the yellow box, obviously). I don't know how much time I'll have to work on it and similar pages, so I'll allow anyone reading this to either suggest changes here, or just make changes directly on the sandbox page. --Tulipclaymore 02:14, February 26, 2012 (UTC)