Forum:SH Archive/New "Monaco" Skin Design for Wookieepedia

Late last year, John Q from Wikia posted a note on wikia-l detailing our plans for a new skin, now called Monaco. The new skin was designed as an evolution of Monobook with single sidebar on the left, prominent article actions, widgets, and a really robust multi-tiered navigation.

Wookieepedia is one of our biggest wikis and a staff favorite, so I just had to put together a Wookieepedia theme as I was designing Monaco. I initially tried to find an image of Coruscant that was a bit more vivid than the current background image that would repeat well. I didn't have much luck - everything that I found was too overpowering. In the end, I put together a Hoth scene and tinted the sky to make it work with the Wookieepedia colours.

Please post comments and feedback in this thread. It's looking like Monaco will be ready next week.

BladeBronson 20:07, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

(This is a rendering of the Photoshop file that I use to generate themes and isn't representative of the content and functionality of the skin. It is intended only to convey the theme's style.)

http://images.wikia.com/inside/images/9/9c/Wookieepedia-monaco.jpg


 * Am I to assume we won't have to deal with ads on the right hand side? --  Riffsyphon  1024 23:22, 22 February 2008 (UTC)
 * That's correct. There is only a banner ad at the top. The sidebar contains no ads, so we were able to narrow it quite a bit to give the article more room. BladeBronson 23:43, 22 February 2008 (UTC)
 * I like the look so far. —Xwing328 (Talk) 06:05, 23 February 2008 (UTC)


 * One other thing to notice is the width of the article is wider than even monobook was. You can read about how to customize this skin here: http://inside.wikia.com/wiki/Monaco_Skin_Customization . You can even have your own personal sidebar by creating the page "User: /Monaco-sidebar (and Monaco-toolbox). This skin will be available to you to choose as default on Monday using the skin chooser. Johnq (talk) 10:09, 23 February 2008 (UTC)
 * As long as nobody messes with Monobook, I don't much care. -- Darth Culator  (Talk) 13:10, 23 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Per Culator; a lot of us (I wouldn't be surprised if it was most of our admins and other highly active users) prefer Monobook to Quartz, and would much prefer to have that option open to us as well. I don't think that simply telling us that this new skin is better (as staff has done with Quartz) will change the fact that Monobook is more aesthetically pleasing and easier to use for advanced functions for a good deal of users. Graestan ( Talk ) 13:16, 23 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Although I personally prefer Monobook, Monaco is a great improvement over Quartz. It certainly looks good, and the extra article width is a welcome change. Thanks for taking the time to customize it for Wookieepedia. :) --Imperialles 13:30, 23 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Per Imp. It's a heck of a lot better than Quartz, but I'm still sticking with Monobook. Hobbes ( Tiger's Lair ) 16:16, 23 February 2008 (UTC)