About this page

This page controls the contents of the navigation sidebar on the left, but it can only be edited by wiki sysops

Translations

To provide translations to the links on the side bar, please edit language specific versions of these messages:

The pages need to be listed in $wgForceUIMsgAsContentMsg configuration variable to be translatable (current setup).

Discussion

Wiki Re-structuring

Obviously the links appearing there, have a knock-on effect as to which pages are regarded as the most important pages of the wiki. I'd like to propose renaming some of these links, particularly (and perhaps most controversially) 'Community Portal'. I feel it is a bad name for what we are using the page for.

Maybe we need to assemble some ideas for page names, perhaps over at WikiProject Cleanup/Structure, and if people seem happy, then we'll need one of the sysops to make the change. -- Harry Wood 10:28, 15 May 2007 (BST)

Hmmm. So much for discussion. It's been changed.

I don't like the fact that 'Recent Changes' link is way down the bottom now. Recent changes is where the wiki community needs to gather to see what's happening. The link is tucked away down the bottom now.

-- Harry Wood 10:39, 29 June 2007 (BST)

OK I've been given wiki 'sysop' permissions so I was able to change this.

I put recent changes as a separate box above, which I think works quite well (it is a very important page on a wiki after all)

To slim down the list of link there, I decided to remove 'random page' since it's not that useful (maybe more useful on a flat structured encyclopedia)

...and also the link to Current Events since this is shown on the main page, which seems prominent enough.

Suggestions for improvement?

I'm thinking 'blog' and 'The map' feel a little incongruous because they are external links out of the wiki.

-- Harry Wood 23:21, 1 July 2007 (BST)

That's an old discussion from 2007. Below there are newer suggestions for restructuring the side-bar as it is now. -- Harry Wood 12:17, 24 March 2012 (UTC)

Search on top

I would like to find "Search" on the top of the sidebar, like in Wikipedia (instead of "lastchanges" with is rather a tool).
Also in openstreetmap.org I would like to find "Search" on the top of the sidebar. (On small displays, now you have first to scroll to find the "Search"-field...)
Thanks, --Markus 11:47, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

That was 2009. Search now appears more prominently in the top right, ever since we swapped to a new 'Vector' skin for MediaWiki. - Harry Wood 12:17, 24 March 2012 (UTC)

SideBar's Links Localisation

Links in the SideBar with 'not EN' National settings go to Main_Page, but must go to xx:Main_Page
May be need change string 'mainpage|mainpage' to 'mainpage-url|mainpage' ?
Then create pages: /MediaWiki:mainpage-url/xx for national links and put inside string "xx:Main_Page"?
Anybody know way to localising links in SideBar? --Calibrator 10:04, 14 October 2009 (UTC)

Work out how to implement it cleanly in wiki syntax + test it and I'll push it live -- firefishy 12:35, 14 October 2009 (UTC)

I don't know way to localising Links in Left Side Bar, sorry :( May be wiki-admin can made localisable links? I'll can translate them to Russian only. --Calibrator 13:05, 14 October 2009 (UTC)

In accordance with http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:$wgForceUIMsgAsContentMsg, it need change only one string in LocalSettings.php file. Never edit DefaultSettings.php; copy appropriate lines to LocalSettings.php instead and amend them as appropriate.

$wgForceUIMsgAsContentMsg = array();

change to

$wgForceUIMsgAsContentMsg = array( 'mainpage-url', 'portal-url', 'mapfeatures-url', 'helppage' );

Anybody can do it? --Calibrator 10:21, 16 October 2009 (UTC)

You have right Calibrator in your first statement. I can fix links in sidebar but you have to unprotect (or just semi-unprotect) this page. Yarl ✉ 20:52, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

Suggestion for restructured sidebar

Looking at the wiki sidebar I thought it was very confusing and hard to scan over. So here is a suggestion how to restructure it:

I am not sure about the Recent Changes placement though. I do not think it should be as prominent as currently. I have visitors, not existing power-users who would actually use it in mind. As last option it has nice focus in my opinion.

Also just now I realise inconsistent capitalisation.

What do you think? HannesHH 21:30, 25 August 2010 (BST)

A very good suggestion and much better than the current structure. Actually, some of the entries could be removed entirely (Recent Changes, for example, isn't that useful, and the Shop would at least need some cleanup to be attractive), but it's probably less controversial to just adopt the improved categorization. The current separation - wiki pages, Special: pages and, for some reason, Recent changes as a separate category - never seemed to make much sense. --Tordanik 11:10, 4 October 2010 (BST)

Well actually "Recent changes" used to be the most useful link once upon a time, but as wiki editing traffic passed a certain level, a couple of years ago, it's no longer useful (except to admire the editing traffic levels) It's also looks a bit more odd as a separate section with the new "vector" skin design. -- Harry Wood 02:06, 12 October 2010 (BST)

This is realy nice, like the style you ordered the items by priority --!i! 13:28, 4 October 2010 (BST)

More discussion over at http://www.openstreetmap.org/user/HannesHH/diary/11960

As a first step I've proposed the rename of the main page. See Talk:Main Page#Rename this page / suppress the title -- Harry Wood 02:06, 12 October 2010 (BST)

Review of wiki sidebar and the map page menu

Moved here from talk:Main Page

Can we have a bit of a review of the side bar?

I would suggest the following tweeks:

Change 'Blog' to 'Blogs' given that it goes to a list of blogs.
Change 'Shop' to 'Merchandise' given that this is the title of the article to which it links.
Move the 'Help:Contents' page to 'Help' so that it matched up with the link (keep the sidebar text the same, change the link)

Also.... should we try to create some better consistency between the sidebar on the main map page and the sidebar on the wiki? Here are some of the inconsistencies. I am not at this stage suggesting what we do about them:

'Blog' on the wiki, 'Community Blogs' on the map page, which link to different places.
'Help' on the wiki, 'Help centre' on the map page, which link to different places.
'Foundation' on the map page, no mention on the wiki sidebar.
'Copyright and license' on the map page, no mention on the wiki sidebar.
'Donations' on the wiki side bar, no mention on the main page. Why not!

-- PeterIto 19:22, 23 March 2012 (UTC)

You should move this discussion to MediaWiki talk:Sidebar. Some related ideas there already. (but yes I think you're right) -- Harry Wood 12:23, 24 March 2012 (UTC)

Translating the sidebar

It appears to be impossible to "edit language specific versions of these messages", as is suggested above. These pages are all protected. How do I go about adding missing translations for sidebar menu items?

--Kars (talk) 11:22, 14 July 2020 (UTC)

I would suggest that you propose your changes on this page and then someone else can edit the protected pages. edit language specific versions of these messages is actually an explanation for wiki administrators/sysops. --Tigerfell

(Let's talk) 12:24, 16 July 2020 (UTC)

Wiki admins / sysops, please add translations for the following items:

—Preceding unsigned comment added by Kars (talk • contribs) 12:57, 16 July 2020‎

Thank you, I updated most of the translations. I am a bit unsure what to do with the help link, because in some languages it links to MediaWiki but in others it links to Wiki:Help. --Tigerfell

(Let's talk) 09:19, 17 July 2020 (UTC)

Spanish translation request

A request for the wiki admins: Please, add this Spanish translation to the links on the side bar. Some already exist, but others are still missing.

Thank you! --Dcapillae (talk) 19:00, 5 January 2021 (UTC)

I did it as good as I could, but not all links were changed successfully. That is not limited to the Spanish translation. I do not know how to fix it and mediawiki.org is not helpful because they use the Translate extension. --Tigerfell

(Let's talk) 22:28, 5 January 2021 (UTC)

@Tigerfell: Yeah, this is a stumper. It all looks to be configured correctly, except only two of the URLs get localized, and not the first two. I've tried customizing a bunch of things and no luck. Do you think it's related to the absence of the Translate extension? – Minh Nguyễn ^💬 09:09, 6 January 2021 (UTC)

No, I do not. I think the feature comes with "Universal Language Selector extension" if it is not implemented in core MediaWiki. It is just that the documentation at mediawiki.org constantly refers to Translate extension, because they are using it and they do not have any docs without Translate, so there is some behaviour that it not/no longer(?) documented. I think I found the issue, see https://github.com/openstreetmap/chef/pull/382. --Tigerfell

(Let's talk) 11:49, 6 January 2021 (UTC)

@Tigerfell: Good find – I wouldn't've guessed that it would be an off-wiki configuration issue. – Minh Nguyễn ^💬 19:24, 6 January 2021 (UTC)

It should be all updated now. I just noticed that the help links are inconsistent, so translations link to MediaWiki help, others link to Get help. --Tigerfell (Let's talk) 13:05, 7 February 2021 (UTC)

Contributors

If this item is necessary in the menu, could you tell me in other words what does it mean? Because when I hear "Contributors", first I think about contributors on the wiki (like me or you), then about OSM contributors (mappers) but when I enter this page, there is a list of institutions which I don't understand. I'm asking becasue I'm thinking how to properly translate it into my language. maro21 18:17, 6 January 2021 (UTC)

@Maro21: Contributors is intended to satisfy requirements from imported data sources that we provide attribution. Since we can't reliably provide attribution on individual features, at least not at the length required for some disclaimers, this page serves as an addendum to the OSM database for satisfying those attribution requirements. The page is linked from osm.org's Copyright page, for instance. I agree that it's a confusing page name. It might be worth proposing renaming the page at Talk:Contributors, but in the meantime, perhaps you could translate it as "Map credits" or something along those lines. – Minh Nguyễn ^💬 19:22, 6 January 2021 (UTC)

Update Spanish translation

A request for the wiki admins: Please, update the Spanish translation of the side bar. Only "Map features" item needs to be updated.

Objetos del mapa (wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/ES:Objetos_del_mapa)

Thank you! — Dcapillae (talk) 09:55, 6 June 2022 (UTC)

Resolved: You are welcome. --Tigerfell

(Let's talk) 10:12, 6 June 2022 (UTC)

Edit request: pa / pnb sidebar labels

The localized page links are not ready yet, these can be added later. These are sidebar labels for the locales pa (Punjabi Gurmukhi) and pnb (Punjabi Shahmukhi). First is pa, second is pnb for each.

The Map

ਨਕਸ਼ਾ ਜਾਇਓ
نقشہ جایو

Map features

ਨਕਸ਼
نقش

Contributors

ਡਾਟੇ ਦੇ ਹਵਾਲੇ
ڈیٹی دے حوالے

Blogs

ਬਲਾਗ ਕੁੜੀਆਂ
بلاگ کڑیاں

Shop

ਬਜ਼ਾਰ
بزار

Donations

ਦਾਨ
دان

Wiki discussion

ਵਿਕਿ ਬਾਰੇ ਆਮ ਗੱਲ ਬਾਤ
وِکی بارے عام گل بات

-- Bgo eiu (talk) 00:07, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

--Tigerfell

(Let's talk) 22:11, 15 October 2022 (UTC)

@Tigerfell: Looks great, thank you! I realised I made a typo for the pnb translation of "Contributors." Should be like this, with bari yeh (different shape used for certain forms of word endings):

ڈیٹے دے حوالے

--Bgo eiu (talk) 16:46, 16 October 2022 (UTC)

And for Wiki discussion, the pa translation should be corrected to:

ਵਿਕੀ ਬਾਰੇ ਆਮ ਗੱਲ ਬਾਤ

Sorry, I'm a little scatterbrained, sometimes I don't spot my spelling mistakes until I look again later --Bgo eiu (talk) 16:56, 16 October 2022 (UTC)

MediaWiki talk:Sidebar

About this page

Translations

Discussion

Wiki Re-structuring

Search on top

SideBar's Links Localisation

Suggestion for restructured sidebar

Review of wiki sidebar and the map page menu

Translating the sidebar

Spanish translation request

Contributors

Update Spanish translation

Edit request: pa / pnb sidebar labels

The Map

Map features

Contributors

Blogs

Shop

Donations

Wiki discussion

Navigation menu

Search