Roblox recently re-did their wiki. By default people will shout ‘Old was better!’ etc.
But hear me out, I believe the new layout has some good qualities but also needs some refinement.
Current layout looks like this
The issue here is two fold.
It has too much fancy stuff
Look at the CFrame Hit section.
CFrame is written as colored text within a box of different color inside a box of another color with a border of yet another color. In sweden that’s called ‘cookie upon cookie’. If everything is highlighted, nothing is highlighted.
It has too much information
The information here is also overwhelming. Majority of people are just looking for the name of the property and it’s return value (CFrame in this case). If you’re wondering if the value is readonly then you should have to look futher down, it’s not top-priority information.
The written DataType/CFrame is also redudant, it should only be a link to CFrame page for those who require more information of that matter.
The good stuff
I find the short codes and explainations above the property section to be very well written and overall great looking! But since I’m here to point out the flaws, I’ll not touch more on this.
Suggestion
Since I’m no graphics-designer have mercy on my mspaint level illustration please.
What I want to pointout here is:
Property name is easily found because the CFrame is gray and the non-vital information moved to the bottom.
CFrame is a link in both title and description.
No need for DataType/CFrame, that’s saved for the CFrame page.
Description could be hidden by default, so when you click the titlebar it shows up.
Yeah that seems pretty good, although I think the readonly, notreplicated text should be a bit more lowkey (everything else is grey).
Either way, I think we should just improve the old wiki style, not use a completely new one (at least for API reference). But it’s probably too late for that now, so I guess the new version will stay as it is. tries to find an example but can’t go to old wiki anymore because wiki.roblox.com is a redirect
I’m one of those people who prefer the old, it’s what I’m used to and it’s just easier for me to read. I’ve been slowly using the new wiki (since stuff on the old wiki is starting to get removed) and would definitely like to see this change. Great suggestion!
The old wiki has had lots of time to establish itself in google. Perhaps given a few more months to settle it will climb the results page.
You may have to adjust your search terms as well. Perhaps Roblox should be sprinkling the word “wiki” around the home page to help with google searches.
I agree. The API references on the new site are a lot harder to read at first glance. It often takes me much longer to find what I’m looking for on the new site compared to the wiki. The wiki had everything we need visible right at a glance.
Like in the example here, the CFrame properties are kinda mixed in with other less important information. This is why takes longer to read through each property to find the one I’m looking for. The data type comes first on each property listing - totally unnecessary. If the property name was the first in the boxes, I could just keep my eyes looking at the same spot on the screen while scrolling through. I think any information other than the name and description should not be shown here. Maybe keep it on the property’s dedicated page or have an “expand” button.
Nonetheless, the new site does have some improvements over the wiki and a much more modern design.
