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Elsewhere we were thinking we should find examples of good layout for math on the web as a help in thinking about how we might improve the nLab look and feel.
Since I just linked to it from the blog: the Online Encyclopeia of Mathematics seems to look reasonably decent.
Maybe just that simply blue bar on the left that they have is not to be underestimated in its effect. It gives the eye something to hold onto.
nLab pages to differ from most other pages that one sees on the net in that they are relatively structureless, except for the text itself. An nLab page with little content looks much more empty than the random page one sees on the web. Maybe this makes people feel uncomfortable, even if they cannot point to it explcitly?
I agree with that last sentiment, Urs. I tried at Froelicher space to break up the display a little, but even so I find my eyes simply glazing over when there's just a long ream of text. The difficulty is in knowing where to stop - obviously one can add loads of stuff in, but it's important that that not detract from reading the content.
In my lectures I'm using beamer and I recently felt that when I had a large amount of mathematics to present then everything being black on white made it difficult to isolate important stuff, or to see the relationships between things - even to identify where the same thing is being referred to again and again. So I've started using colour and colouring things by what they are. So I have predefined colours for objects, morphisms, vectors, matrices, and scalars and just type '\type{vector}{v} \in \type{object}{V}` (unfortunately, the filters won't let me put colour in discussions!). I find it easier to look at, but I've only just started using it so I'm not sure what the students think.
Some people might say "Ugh! I don't like colours!" just like they didn't like fancy fonts. However, colours are easier to change using CSS than fancy fonts so it's less of a "one size fits all" solution.
Sounds interesting. Now a question whose (polite) answer will certainly be: RTF; but I ask anyway: can we make colored text using instiki?
Another question: how hard would it be to change something (some CSS code, I suppose) such that we'd have a, say, bright blue vertical bar running on the left of each nLab page, parallel to the text?
Colour is easy. I shan't say RTF because I'm often guilty of that myself!
I think we should have a test page to play with, a bit like the Zen Garden but with some mathematics. This should probably happen over on the lab elves web to avoid annoying the rest of the n-gang. For best comparision, we should pick a standard page and copy it over. I'd go for a fairly long page since short pages are fairly easy to read anyway. Froelicher spaces fits the bill for me, but if someone thinks there's a better one to play with then do suggest it.
The Froelicher page is a very good test example. We want in the end a page for which we can say: this looks really good. It makes sense to try to make all other pages follow this style.
Should I maybe say this more explicitly:
the reason why the pages I (and others, I think) am working on don't look like your Froelicher page is not that I/we wouldn't like it that way. It's because either I/we haven't thought enough about how to do it, or -- the real problem -- lack of time.
A while ago we had this discussion on the def/lemma/theorem/proof environments. I do know how to use these. It would be nice if we had the software in the background then build a decent looking page with that kind of contextual information.
One thing I think you guys are missing on ALL the n-Lab is PICTURES. There are tons of diagrams but very few PICTURES. Categories seem to me one of the most naturally amenable topics to drawing pictures there is. A nice illustration is a good way to break up a long string of text.
In fact, I can't say I understand something until I can draw a picture of it. I suspect pictures would help a LOT of people, but they are a requirement for me.
I would say, pick a page similar to Froelicher space but which has not had anything special done to it. Something as long as Froelicher space, but much uglier, you see.
Suggestions: category of fibrant objects, SEAR, geometric infinity-function theory.
As for pictures, Eric, do you mean like the one at induced representation?
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As for pictures, Eric, do you mean like the one at induced representation?
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<p>Yeah, that picture is nice. More things like that would be great. Or even things like what I put at <a href="http://ncatlab.org/ericforgy/show/diamonation">diamonation</a>.</p>
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Re Eric':
sure, more pictures would be great. We need more of many other aspects, too. Anyone who feels like contributing pictures should do. I won't much for time reasons for the time being, though. Not because I don't like them. On the contrary.
Re Andrew:
let's test new designs on the meta web, yes, but maybe it would be good to quickly implement some simple CSS refinement of the nLab layout, say just one that creates a bar on the left as in that Online Dictionary example I mentioned above, just so that IF the lack of such an optical structure element might really be the main reason why nLab pages appear unpleasant to many, we have a quick fix for it. We can always improve on that later.
Who did the diagrams in one of your recent pictures? I could tell you've attracted a co-author with some artistic abilities. Get them over here! :)
Check out zen garden (doriath). It's nothing to look at yet, but maybe it will be by the time we're done.
I think that we'll have the best idea of how things will work if we edit the web to change the CSS rather than just the page.
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Who did the diagrams in one of your recent pictures?
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<p>You probably mean in my recent paper?</p>
<p>I did them.</p>
<p>But this is less about artistic ability (even though that's a factor, too) than about time. Producing a nice diagram/picture etc takes time.</p>
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The first problem with the 'edit the web' strategy is that only those with the main password can do that. The second is that it is destructive: we can't have lots of examples up for people to look at and think "I could do better than that".
@ Andrew
Good point. One thing that we might do is to strip all of the CSS from that web (although much of it is locked away in instiki.css, so I'm not sure how to turn that off) and stick it at the top of the zen garden page. Then tell people to copy the source of that page to a new page and edit the CSS. (Something to check: can we [[!include]] CSS?)
The answer to my question seems to be Yes, although I seem to have to make query boxes come out {: query} instead of {: .query}. And I'll have to RTFM to figure out how some of this is supposed to work, so the ugly junk up top is the part that I haven't phrased correctly yet.
But now my vision is that people will be able to create various CSS pages and include them in the zen garden to see the effects.
@ Eric: you mean pictures like these perhaps? You'll be asking for animations next!
@ Toby: it's something to do with the difference between referencing by class and by id. I don't really understand it, but I've encountered that issue as well. We could strip off the instiki css by redefining it, though given that whatever we do will overlay the instiki.css anyway I think it's best to start with the "blank slate" being the instiki.css rather than a true blank slate.
@ Andrew
I agree about the blank slate. (I guess the ideal case would be to remove instiki.css from the site entirely, to give people a true blank slate, but that would be disruptive!)
@ Andrew @ Eric
The link to the SVG at the bottom of your first link is broken. Also, the link for ‘knottedArm’ in your second link returns an empty file.
My webpage-generation-script kept complaining about that but I never got round to figuring out why. Turns out I got my numbers confused: should have been 3-1.svg not 3-2.svg. Fixed now!
(I hope you're not going to claim overtime for doing Lab Elf work on other websites.)
I hope you're not going to claim overtime for doing Lab Elf work on other websites.
Yes indeed, and I demand 150% of my normal wages, no less!
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<blockquote>@ Eric: you mean pictures <a href="http://www.math.ntnu.no/~stacey/Seminars/chern.html">like these</a> perhaps? You'll be asking for <a href="http://www.math.ntnu.no/~stacey/Seminars/komin.html">animations</a> next!</blockquote>
<p>Yes! Those pictures would be perfect for the nLab :)</p>
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The problem is converting them to decent sized SVGs ...
But what about the animations? Didn't you like them as well? That's the real reason I put those links there. (Not that I'm really suggesting them for the n-lab; I just had a lot of fun doing them and am quite pleased with the result - for a first attempt).
I didn't see the animations because they require downloading, which is one step too many :)
I can click on them and see them in my browser! (^_^)
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