Language option appearing in user dropdown
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	apaskulin
	Aug 31 2020, 8:46 PM

Description

Background

I'm not sure what changed in the last few days, but I now see an "English" option in the user dropdown menu on the Beta Site when logged in:

Screen Shot 2020-08-31 at 12.57.52 PM.png (544×828 px, 48 KB)

This pulls up the dialog to select a display language. However, I don't think it's very clear what this option does. In my experience, language switchers aren't usually embedded in dropdown menus.

Options

Remove this option from the user menu since it is accessible via Preferences (which will be added to the menu)
Move the language switcher to a place that makes its function more obvious
Rename the option to something like "Set language", "Switch language", or "Language: English". Or use the same language icon used on Vector for language switching.

Thoughts and feedback welcome!

Details

Related Changes in Gerrit:

	Subject	Repo	Branch	Lines +/-
	Use OOUI for user menu and remove ULS user menu item	mediawiki/skins/WikimediaApiPortal	master	+82 -113

Customize query in gerrit

Event Timeline

apaskulin created this task.Aug 31 2020, 8:46 PM

Restricted Application added a subscriber: Aklapper. · View Herald TranscriptAug 31 2020, 8:47 PM

apaskulin updated the task description. (Show Details)Aug 31 2020, 9:24 PM

@CCicalese_WMF Let me know what you think about the three listed options

The menu option comes from Extension:UniversalLanguageSelector. It is included in the menu since it is in the "allowed list" in the skin template code. By way of comparison, in Vector it shows up to the left of the user icon at the top right of the page with an icon that helps the user understand its purpose. We can easily remove it from the menu by removing it from the allowed list. It would still be accessible from preferences, but only for logged in users. The language selector is not currently shown for logged out users. What is the plan for switching languages for anonymous users?

What is the plan for switching languages for anonymous users?

I was thinking about that, too. I tried switching the language in Vector while logged out and got "Log in to select a different language for menus." when I selected "English".

Screen Shot 2020-09-04 at 4.16.37 PM.png (566×1 px, 84 KB)

apaskulin moved this task from Backlog to Ready on the Platform Team Workboards (Green) board.Sep 9 2020, 3:36 PM

apaskulin triaged this task as Medium priority.Sep 9 2020, 3:39 PM

apaskulin updated the task description. (Show Details)

Change 626547 had a related patch set uploaded (by Cicalese; owner: Cicalese):
[mediawiki/skins/WikimediaApiPortal@master] Use OOUI for user menu and add icon to ULS menu item

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/626547

gerritbot added a project: Patch-For-Review.Sep 11 2020, 3:36 AM

Change 626547 merged by jenkins-bot:
[mediawiki/skins/WikimediaApiPortal@master] Use OOUI for user menu and remove ULS user menu item

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/626547

ReleaseTaggerBot added a project: MW-1.36-notes (1.36.0-wmf.10; 2020-09-22).Sep 15 2020, 3:00 PM

Maintenance_bot removed a project: Patch-For-Review.Sep 15 2020, 3:10 PM

We tried to improve the language option by adding the standard language icon, but we weren't able to get the functionality to make it work. Since language switching is available through user preferences and via the keyboard icon attached to the search bar, we opted to remove this option from the user menu.

Verified on beta. Thanks, Cindy!

	F32245878: Screen Shot 2020-09-04 at 4.16.37 PM.png
	Sep 4 2020, 11:17 PM

	F32238203: Screen Shot 2020-08-31 at 12.57.52 PM.png
	Aug 31 2020, 8:46 PM

Language option appearing in user dropdownClosed, ResolvedPublicActions