Last modified: 2011-03-14 00:32:39 UTC
In Preferences we see Skin Chick (Preview) Classic (Preview) Cologne Blue (Preview) Modern (Preview) MonoBook (default) (Preview) MySkin (Preview) Nostalgia (Preview) Simple (Preview) Vector (Preview) In the file "HISTORY" we see: ..."Chick" skin for mobile devices... I.e., each skin apparently has different goals. What needs to be done is somehow getting these goals across to the user, while at the same time keeping the list tidy. One method would be tooltips with a blurb about each skin when the mouse is upon it. However, text browser users need to be able to see the blurbs too. Or/and you could group the skins: Moblie/PDA Nerdsworth (Preview) Holmesglug (Preview) Artistic Plushwaithe VII (Preview)... No need to go hog wild like WordPress theme screenshots in their 'dashboard'. But at least do add a word or two telling the differences between the skins. You see the user currently has to click to preview each theme one by one, and by the time he gets to the bottom, he has forgotten what the top one looked like. Or e.g., mention that they are grouped, say, in order of decreasing "calorie content", so e.g., users of small devices would try the ones at the bottom first.
I don't like this idea. I think it needlessly complicates things for users. When a user hears the term "skin" they think it's the visual style they wish to see when accessing the website. They should not be thinking of what medium it's on. If we're producing skins designed for different platforms (ie: chick is for mobile, modern/monobook for desktop browsing), then we are going about skins in the wrong way. Ideally, we should design all skins so they degrade nicely to mobile and text browsers. I would think effort would be better spent improving skins across all our supported browsers, rather than targeting specific browsers with specific skins.