Did you see that categories now appear at the bottom of profiles?

Question

Hi WikiTreers,

Categories now appear at the bottom of a profile instead of above the biographies. See, for example, https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Eisenhower-1

There is a little "[categories]" link where categories used to appear. Where categories appear at the bottom, there is an "[edit]" link that takes you to the text section of the profile editing page. There's also a "[top]" link that brings back to the top of the page.

We discussed this change a lot (most recently here and here) but I realize it will be jarring, and not everyone agrees with it.

An important point that emerged in our conversations is that categories aren't just for us. They're not just for genealogy collaboration. They are part of the genealogy content that we're growing and what makes it accessible to others, now and in the future.

For example, categorizing people as farmers may seem genealogically meaningless and overly broad for any practical purpose here. But some future descendant might want to see all their ancestors who were farmers, or some historian might want to see farmers in a certain geographical area.

Categorization is very useful for search and navigation, but the usage of categories has been constrained because members have only wanted to use them for genealogically important things -- things that merit appearing above the biography. Their overly-prominent position made their usage controversial. Now I think members will feel more comfortable seeing them used more liberally.

By the way, all this is about their appearance on the profile page. The placement of the category tags when editing a profile doesn't need to change.

We've made two other categorization-related changes:

1.) We simplified the introduction to categorization and moved around the more advanced instructions.

2.) We created a form for requesting a new category. Creating categories isn't something most members need to tackle on their own. This form is now linked from the bottom of every category page.

If you're an advanced categorizer you'll also be interested in the nice Categorization Project newsletter that Natalie and Steven posted a few days ago.

Onward and upward,

Chris

Comments

You can add a sticker. That's what stickers are for.

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Just for the record:

• I'm still unhappy about having the categories at the bottom
• I'm still categorizing profiles I create
• but I don't actually use them for discovery work as much as I used to. This may be because of the characteristics of the local community I am currently working on - or because the categories are no longer "in my face"
• I stopped giving out downvotes long ago, when I understood they work as a black spot on the giver as well as on a receiver

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Just to give my two cents:

* I did not particularly like the categories being moved.

* I still add categories to profiles I manage, and not less than before.

* I add categories to profiles I don't manage more often than before, because now no one can complain that they "clutter" the profile.

* I still don't like the idea of categorizing anything and everything, down to (for instance) defunct university hockey teams, and still very much dislike some types of categories.

* And yes, this whole episode has somewhat changed my work on categories because I now systematically take care to add an explanation and source to any category I add, which may not always have been the case before.

I vehemently disagree that moving a category down is "wiping out" something that was important in someone's life. If it was important then it should have a paragraph in the biography. Use a header. It will stand out and be easy to jump to from the Contents section. I fail to see how adding a category is honoring something.

And I no longer give downvotes either.

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Here it is at last: the reason most people liked to have categories up top:

"feeling they should be honored for their service and now it is wiped out"

So many people used categories to show a person's military service, or to honour them in some way.  This is NOT what categories are for.  They are to make groups. It is not to show that one particular person was a chief petty officer at Pearl Harbour.  A category is to group all the chief petty officers at Pearl Harbour.

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Well, it is not the reason I preferred to have them on top.

I use almost exclusively location categories, which are great for grouping families in the old Swedish patronymic society.

I liked the easy access of having them at the top, navigating back and forth between individual and neighbour group. Extra clicks and jumps add up when you spend most of your days WikiTreeing, as I do.

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Exactly! takes longer to get things done

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I do agree to let this lie.. but please let us me nice to each other.  no need to be harsh to each others ideas.  It is time to spend our time adding data, and bios, sources, and photos to our family TREE.

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Carole, we have let this ride / lie without clear closing from leadership above. There are many differing and important points being made here. Just being 'nice' to the ideas of others does not do justice to where injustice is being felt. I do agree that we avoid DWWA but honest and straightforward conversation is what we are having here. And yes - it can be harsh without being insulting. We are all trying to spend our time adding data, and bios, sources, and photos to our family tree.

Which makes it all more so frustrating and even insulting is when there is no clear communication from above, not even on the status of possible amendments and / or the limits of what can be done.

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So it's clear: there are no plans to change to the location of the categories section.

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Jamie,

If you have any influence on changes,  the change that I believe is needed is that the  very small link to categories (now at the top of the biography) be made more visible.......  I'm usually pretty good at finding things but certainly missed this one.   I thought Categories had been eliminated from profiles because I didn't think to scroll down to the very bottom and I missed the new link.

Just my late opinion!    We were in the middle of a 700 mile move in April and May,  so I wasn't active in WikiTree!

Answer 1

I was initially supportive of the move but I do not support where they currently are.

I made a very quick mockup of what I envisioned - categories underneath Sources in some kind of box to set them off from the surrounding text. My mockup isn't perfect, I was just reusing a style you already had in the stylesheet, but you get the picture. Click to see full size

Comments

That does indeed look way better than what we've got now. Great job.

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This I could get behind. It looks good, still streamlined, the box draws some attention, & doesn't look out of place.

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I do like that Katie, Looks sharp & neat, & I like the Box.

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That's what I envisioned, too.

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Nice solution Katie, looks great. But I'm afraid this is invain. I have the impression that this new setup has been deliberately made because of the proliferation of categories and its questionable usefulness. The other change, to wich I have not seen responses yet, is that you have now to fill in a form to create a new category and submit it to the categorization project for review.

So in my opinion, categories are intentionally inconspicuous because the management and leadergroup apparently finds them unimportant.

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I suggested the same thing when this was originally announced, although I suggested the green rounded box class. In any case, I have already implemented the change on my browser and it makes it much easier for me to distinguish them now.

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Katie, that appears to be a very reasonable and attractive compromise. The change will still be a net negative for me and the purposes I've spent my time on since 2013 here at wikitree but it is significantly better than effectively erasing categories altogether.

Instead of NONE of the potential new connections who browse wikitree for the first time EVER seeing a category, maybe a few of the more persistent ones will scroll down below the sources and see them.....

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Steven, What did you mean by "I have already implemented the change on my browser and it makes it much easier for me to distinguish them now"? I'd be interested to see what you've done. Thanks

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Sorry, I should have clarified. I use a CSS plugin on my browser so I can change how some items appear to me.

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O. Thanks Steven, I don't think I need one of those I don't do Web Design generally so it wouldn't get much use, me thinks :)

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I use a CSS plugin on my browser so I can change how some items appear to me.

Can you share what its called?

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Nice job on your mockup Katie. I would also like to see a header for "Categories" like there is a header for Bio, Sources, etc. And I would still like to see it higher on page, like under the Bio section. Some profiles have so much text, it might still get lost in this position under Sources.   Even so, your mockup is 100's of times better than at the extreme bottom of page.

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I also like this and it is where I envisaged the position of  categories when I read the original proposal.

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Great mock-up Katie! It would be fantastic if your suggestion could be implemented 

Answer 2

YES AND I HATE IT!!!!! This is going to be SO inconvenient! Please restore Categories to the top of the page immediately! This is as bad as taking subtitles out of a book! Please fix it immediately! I can't deal with my categories not at the top!

Thank you!

Comments

Some people seemed to be using categories almost like stickers - to proclaim how wonderful their ancestor was.

Categories, as you know, are for grouping people.

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I am the PC for Irish Roots, and I have to say RJ, you're taking what Steve said and twisting it.  That's not fair.  Please don't make the situation any more confusing for people.

I'll explain again.  County Cork, and it's sub-categories for parishes, townlands, and towns are to be used for profiles of ancestors (or others) we are researching.

The County Cork Project category is supposed to contain profiles of people actively involved in the project.  

This does not appear to be how that category is being used and it needs to be remedied.

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There are hundreds of parish and townland categories in County Cork.  Most of them are empty, and most of the rest contain 1 profile.

It's quite impractical to trawl through them all.  And there's no way of collecting all the profiles or viewing them all together.  So for practical working purposes, they're pretty useless.

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And they will stay that way unless people stop sticking profiles in the County Cork category when they could go in a parish or townland.

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Well said, Isabelle!  Thank you.  Irish Roots categories have been notoriously difficult for people to use and understand.  That is the whole point of our Review.  To make them less confusing and easier for people to use.

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Like I said, it's quite impractical to trawl through them all.  And there's no way of collecting all the profiles or viewing them all together.  So for practical working purposes, they're pretty useless.

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So I thought I'd have a go.  I picked a random profile.  It took me about 15 minutes to figure out what low-level category I would need to create for it.  Then I'd have had to figure out the parents, if I'd pursued it.

At the end of which, I'd have had another one-person category and nothing useful achieved.

It's all a massive impediment.  People don't come here to waste their time like this.

What I want is, if I've got a placename, I write [[Category: placename, County Cork]] on the profile.  If I get a red link, I create the page with [[Category: Places in County Cork]] as the parent.  This builds a great big long alphabetical list of placenames in County Cork.  And if somebody else wants to classify them, that's their hobby not mine.

But of course that still doesn't address the problem of making useful county-wide lists of profiles.

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Thank you for clearing that up RJ.  That's exactly how it's done.  Users add categories.  Project participants make sure profiles are placed where they should be.  If a category doesn't exist, there's a process for creating it.  Excellent explanation.

I'm certainly open to a generic category for less experienced users to put Ireland related profiles into.  That would be a maintenance category for project members to pull from.  I'll bring it up for discussion with the project.

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Sorry, but i do not need a category for people who are actively involved in researching County Cork. Give them a badge or something.

I need a way to group the profiles of the ancestors in the County Cork Project to see how many we have, where they are located, and if there are duplicates. Wikitree has inadequate locality searching and putting the profiles into too many little categories does not let me see how many Burkes are in County Cork for instance, or how many Harringtons. I would have loved a project sticker, but no one made me one. So County Cork Project is the most important category I have and I want everyone researching in County Cork to add it to the TOP of their County Cork profiles.

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Thanks Sharon.  I'll pm you so we can discuss this further.

Answer 3

I don't like it at all. If they were further up, but still under the sources it would be fine to me. I literally spent 20 minutes looking for the categories on a profile, even clicked the category button, but my eyes just slid on past because I don't bother looking at anything under the merges.

I add a lot to cemeteries and I don't want to constantly scroll down to see if I forgot to add a profile to a cemetery. I'm not sure that I'll care to make any more profiles for cemeteries now. I don't think new users or visitors are going to even bother looking for categories that far down.

Comments

I just had a look at one of your Avondale disaster profiles and found the categories straight away. No problem. The link takes me straight to them. I'd prefer to read about the  life events in the biography though, but I guess this one is newly made. I'd like to see something about the Welsh connection too.  I noticed from the cemetery category that many others were born in Wales. So it is working fine ! No need to stop doing what you do :-)

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The problem for some people is that you can no longer see the categories at a glance.

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Yes Joe, most of the Avondale profiles are very new. I wish I could add more to many of the profiles, but the fact is that many of the men hadn't even been in PA very long, and plenty still had family back in Wales. I'm still looking through newspapers for more info on them.

Washburn Street, where 63 of the 110 victims are buried is a primarily Welsh cemetery. There's a huge Welsh community in Scranton, because coal mining was so prevalent. Many came to work the mines. Also, with so many having similar names, I'd hate to mix up anyone, and it's so easy to do.

Answer 4

There is a great deal of dissent here, a modest amount of we'll get used to it, some very fair concern about future use of categories given the new location, and quite a number of well-reasoned suggestions that could improve the change.

Chris, is all of this being taken under advisement by the working group?

Comments

The silence is deafening.

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IT IS TIME TO RESTORE CATEGORIES TO THEIR PROPER PLACE AND IMPORTANCE! THANK YOU!

Answer 5

I've read most of the dissenting opinions here and I will make the same observation here that I made in a different posting about the subject.

There appear to be two camps of categorizers. The first adds categories to profiles. The second adds profiles to categories.

If one is a member of the first camp then moving the categories to the bottom of the page defeats the purpose of their use of categories because the categories are not "enhancing" the profile.

The second camp is affirming the change because they add profiles to categories as a means to group them for research purposes, not enhance them. Where the categories are placed on the page is totally irrelevant to that objective.

The purpose of categories is to group profiles so that researchers can find other profiles within their areas of interest. That means when a member adds a category to a profile it should be because they want to let other researchers find that profile when they go to the category page. If members are instead using them to tell a story about the profiled person, they may want to rethink and consider telling the story in the Biography. Just my 2 cents.

Just in case anyone wondered, I approve of the relocation of categories to the bottom of the profile page.

Comments

I use them both ways.  I appreciate that you see there are diverse ways of using the categories.  Many here have posted items with narrow views about how categories are normally used or may be used in the future.  The future is now and the ways in which categories are used are quite numerous.     Some of these ways may not be ideal of may run counter to the narrow perspective or expectation.  I'd like it if people took a more generous view of the category using camps and the diversity of uses and approaches.  Thank you for helping make one of the dimensions more clear.

Enhancing the work overall (and collaboration on the work) is my aim rather than enhancing particular profiles.  The latter is achieved by the former - through making the work flow better and more clear and collaborative more eyes are getting to the profiles that need work and more sources are added and more problems have been resolved.  It's both an individual and a team tool.

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Deb, 

Your camp dichotomy is not sufficient to encapsulate the various reasons that people use categories. I add categories to profiles BECAUSE it adds profiles to categories. Those alphabetical listings of profiles within the category are an extremely helpful, often used tool for me. 

In ONE category ALONE,  I've added over TWO THOUSAND profiles. Those listings help me keep order and organization and are a primary tool for me to avoid duplications and verify proper familial connections.

Additionally and the MOST fundamentally IMPORTANT reason I have spent all these years on wikitree and on adding category tags to all these profiles (and all those profiles to categories) is because they are HIGH VALUE cousin bait. My purpose for all the blood sweat and tears I've invested into this site (and what I though a large part of the goal of this site was originally--when did this change & why didn't I get the memo?) was to connect & collaborate. When an Italian cousin who may or may not speak English fluently and who definitely is not a wilitree power user sees a familiar name on a google search and sees how many familial links already exist on this site and how much effort I've put into it---just maybe they might be a little more inclined to contact me and then join the site.

I don't give a rat's brown a$$ if some wikitree power user is offended by the usually one or two categories that used to be on top of the profiles that I spend MY TIME to create. I care that my effort increases the chances that more people will join in the effort and add value to those profiles and continue to expand the tree.

What a waste of my time!

BTW Michael: well said.

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I'm sorry, Nick, but I feel I'm missing something here. How does where the categories are placed on the profile page affect the grouping of the profiles in those categories or change the results of a Google search, or in any way alter the value of your contributions to WikiTree?

The two thousand+ profiles you have added to that category are still there. The profiles you've added to that category haven't changed or disappeared. I am truly at a loss to see how any of your work has changed or been lost or became reduced in value by moving the category links to the bottom of the page.

If I have an interest in the "subject" of a category, I will go to the category to find profiles that fit that subject. If my interest is in the profile of a particular person because they are a relative, then I want to see their story and their relationship to me, not a bunch of category links to groupings of other profiles that may or may not interest me.

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Deb--apparently you, Chris & the leadership group are missing the point entirely. This isn't about what you or I or any other person who has experience on this website can do---my problem is that what has changed IMO has drastically diminished (or completely negated) the categories as a tool/lure for ALL of the people who may come to wikitree and view profiles see the category tag and choose to investigate further.

For me, sure I can tab up and down using that stupid tiny link or other methods---sure I can keep using categories albeit with EXTRA steps (thanks for that!)  but y'all need to get your head out of.....the clouds...and recognize that wikitree is already difficult to navigate for newbies and if you want new people to join then you need to start making it easier/clearer instead of more tedious.

Echoing Eric Weddington's post, there are plenty of things that could use some fixing here and this wasn't one of them (sure was no where on my list!)

How about fixing the Primary Photo tag when uploading images so that the user decides when to click it instead of making me having to constantly click it OFF to avoid death certificates showing as such?

How about giving me some control of the RELATED SURNAMES so that I can explain on that page how a name like CRIASIA is actually the same thing as the 'americanized' version CREASIA---instead I did that on the category page....which NO newbie is ever going to look at in the future.

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Nick and Michael are right - and I use an had planned to use them both ways too - now I have to wonder if it is worth it - and no response is very unsettling

and the no change to what you did, very unsettling

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Nick is absolutely right. The people I am trying to attract to WikiTree will Google a name and find an interesting link to a person or place. They are very unlikely to click on "categories" in tidgy font to see what is there nor are they likely to scroll below the first page. At this point all they are interested in is the basics about the person.

Answer 6

An open letter to WikiTree Members on the New Categorization Implementation

Right off the bat I was a dissenter. I felt this placed the Categories many of us use and like to use in a position that made their usage superfluous. However, I like that it removed them from the top of the viewable Biography for the aesthetic reasons. Also, I still do not understand the reasoning that in doing this it made Categories more attractive to use. Basically how, if they are placed below the lowest Circle of Hell in Dante's Inferno. I understand there are new and better things coming regarding the use of Categories on WikiTree, but since I am not privy to those things, I was left quite perplexed for now.

Previously on this Question, I replied with a possible 'work around' as I called it. An unfortunate choice of words as I did not explain in a sufficient manner what I alluding to. I apologize for any misinterpretations made from this. I never meant this to implore members to quit using Categories using the standard procedures and thus as a means to defeat this new implementation. Using the Internal Link only for a Category does not place the Profile on the specified Category Page which then nullifies their usage. Rather, I meant it to be a way for those of us who would like to see our Categories in a more convenient location on the Profile. The best of both worlds. Please see a Profile I have used my plan on. Edward Adams This is an Open profile so feel free to click on Edit to see what I did.

The standard Categories links are still placed in their normal position on the Profile and are then included at the bottom as per the new plan. By creating a new Heading and using the Internal Links for each Category here they are still easily seen by those who view our Profiles. And by using a descriptive notation for each, I feel this makes this more inviting for the viewer to use these them than just the staid [[Category: Whatever]] whether they were on the top of the Profile or the bottom.. Possibly this makes those who are new to WikiTree and do not understand the concept of using Categories to increase our connectivity more likely to see just what is this and what does it mean. So increasing Category usage as noted in the new plan synopsis.

One slight problem with this method are those Stickers that place the Profile in a Category, some Project or Military Service Stickers come to mind, will need to have their actual Category link added here as these do not appear on the Profile Edit Page, only in the View mode. A little more work I admit for those of us who like our Categories to be seen, but worth the effort I feel.

I have worked on and created many Categories and was seriously considering either curtailing or just quitting my usage of Categories as many others have noted. Using this method has changed my mind.

As an end note, I also believe this helps in better SEO keyword optimization. Google, as well as other sites, spiders like to see the same information on a page multiple times, especially if there is also a different use of the same term or phrase. Using the notations is a plus in this factor.

Can't we all just get along?

- Rodney King

That's my story and I'm sticking to it. ;)

Answer 7

In the English language, you read left to right, so your eye is drawn to the first thing you see on the left.

It took a lot of scanning to finally find this teeny, tiny, little category link.

We have many WikiTree members that are older with related vision problems.  Some require reading glasses, whether old or not, to read normal text.

Point being the decison to replace categories at the top with a link, the link should at least be on the left and large enough to see; maybe not as large as headings, but "normal" text size of other standard text AND placed on the left.

That might help relieve at least some of the problem of the categories being at the very bottom of the page.

If you miss the link at the top and are scrolling down the page to Genealogy Tools - the categories still can be missed because of the Merge and other site-related links in above the categories.  At least put information the categories supply as close to the profile as possible -maybe right below Sources.

Answer 8

WOW! I can see this change is SO contentious. I have read most of the comments, and many have made good cases both for and against the change.

For what it's worth, I will add my own opinion - I agree with the move, but think it is now too far down, and would prefer to see the categories either just before, or after the Sources.

You will never please everyone, but change is both inevitable and desirable, so I thank you for all you do to make WT what it is today.

Answer 9

I don't have strong feelings about this, but if my vote was requested, I would prefer that categories be restored to where they were.  The very few profiles with too many categories are exceptions.  (Plus it would allow for a cooling down period, and a re-visit of the question in a couple of years.)

And it's clear that while WikiTree is based on Wikipedia infrastructure, it's not Wikipedia.  It has many genealogical elements that change its character, and its users use it in somewhat different ways.  Most users work on a subset of related records, where extra categorization is helpful.  Projects create additional categorization needs.  The enormous number of error conditions associated with genealogical data generate additional maintenance categories, preferably with high and immediate visibility.  Some categories really do seem to need top level visibility.

Because there appears to be more demand for more categories, and new ways of using categories, perhaps it should be catered to, not just limit it to the traditional uses.  So long as they aren't in the way, what's the harm ...  More info and more access points are never a bad thing.

I'd like to make a suggestion, for your consideration - move all categories to the top of the *right* profile column, above the DNA section, and above the tag section if it exists.  That would allow the bio to appear as high as possible in the left main column, and allow immediate visibility to all categories.

Answer 10

First off, I have reread my responses after cooling off and realize how angry/hateful/hurtful they are and want to apologize to Deb Durham and everyone else I may have offended. I especially want to apologize to Eowyn. You did not earn or deserve my curt, dismissive reply to your e-mail. You are a lovely person whom I have always held in high regard.

I have always attempted to conduct myself  in a pleasant, polite and respectful manner in my interactions on this site and have done my best to act as an ambassador of goodwill for this site when interfacing with the world at large. Again, I apologize to all for stepping off that trail.

Secondly, let me try to explain the roots of my anger and of my dissent.

Part of the anger came from the fact that I felt blindsided by this change. Don't say it was discussed in C2G. I don't come to wikitree to chat and I rarely go there. I log on and immediately go to the front line, get in the trenches and get to work. Which is why I average over 1500 entries a month and am only ranked #1289 on C2G after 6 years here. Recently, there was much ado about reaching 20 million profiles. Chris/leadership, I ask you directly: Did you get there on C2G or in the trenches? There MUST be a better way to communicate from the command tents to the trenches before changes like this are made.

Another part of the anger comes from the fact that I feel like I've wasted my precious time. Categories have been a major tool for me both in my daily work and in my ambassadorship to the world. They are a substantial part of what I consider to be real in-the-trenches 'cousin bait'. "Look at this!---if you join wikitree, you can tie into this wealth of pre-existing data and interconnections"

Categories have been part of that arsenal from my own profile page:

From my 2017 Misson Statement (when my focus was within the USA):

Where I have found specific locations for clusters of inter-related families in places like Grayson County, Virginia, Cass County, Missouri & Ogle County, Illinois, I have tried to add links on those category pages for other researchers to follow and to add to the alphabetical (sometimes easier to search through) name listings there.

My deepest hope is that these profiles will be found by my cousins and that these cousins will add the additional facts and details that will make the biographies of their ancestors more complete. Thereafter, I hope these cousins will join me in trying to dig deeper into our common ancestors.

Cousins, if you find a profile here which I've created or maintain that you have an interest in, do not hesitate to contact me. I will be more than happy to add you as the Profile Manager, to the Trusted List or to help you get started on this site.

From my 2018 Misson Statement (when I expanded to international):

As a point of origin or as a home, many of the people will be added to the Casalvecchio di Puglia, Foggia, Italy category page. Some will also be added to the Milford, Massachusetts category page as this was the primary destination for many of the immigrants who settled here.

To my connections off of this site and out into the world at large:

Feb 6, 2018

"With this effort still in its infancy, I've only tried to connect family groups but don't have any real details to add about their lives. If you have family from this area, take a look at the alphabetical listing s here https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Category: ... a%2C_Italy and you may see some surnames you're familiar with....only 300 names so far.....more to follow."

March 31, 2019

"Your GGM & her family are already on the tree https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Zurlo-11 and notations are there for your GGF, Alessandro Porzio and their children. Click on the 'SHOW ANCESTORS' button and I think you'll be surprised"

https://www.italiangenealogy.com/forum/locations-in-italy/42017

Whether my particular use for categories is what they were intended for or not, I hope you can see how much effort I've put into them, how I have tried to use them to further what I once thought was the primary goal of this site and how much I am disappointed by this casual discarding of them.

Answer 11

I like it.  I support any change that unclutters the bio, especially the area between the facts and relationships and the beginning of the text.  The [categories] link was a great idea, although I agree it could be more prominent.  Once you know where it is, that ceases to be an issue.  Of course, if you move the link later, people will complain about that.  The [top] link after the categories was an equally terrific idea.

People should calm down and stop complaining about having to scroll.  No scrolling necessary.  Use the link.  In Windows, use Control-End to go straight to the bottom, and Control-Home to jump back to the top, if you don't like the links.  The only time you have to scroll or page up and down, is when you need to get from the top or bottom to some location deep in the middle of a long bio.  That was true before the change.

Comments

I have to scroll every time I edit a profile, regardless of the length of the information contained, because I need to resize the edit box (to avoid additional scrolling!), which is too long and too narrow in my browser (Firefox Quantum).

I have to scroll to read questions and answers in G2G whenever a question has several replies or it has long replies.

I'm sure my fellow WikiTreers have other examples of why they have to scroll, too. And they should feel free to complain about it whenever they want - but calmly, of course.

Scrolling is just a part of using computers and the internet, so we have to live with it until we can directly use our minds to accomplish tasks!

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I referred to scrolling in order to get to the categories at the bottom of the profile, and back to the top.  Which, from this thread, I understood to be a big source of unhappiness with this change.  Sorry if that wasn't clear.

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Whether it's scrolling down and back or clicking the categories/top links, it's still fodder for complaints (a.k.a. feedback), Herbert.

Sometimes it's tough to teach us Veteran WikiTreers new tricks - or at least to accept them!

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Thanks to whomever for the downvotes! 

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You're in good company, Herbert. I think most who weren't negative got downvotes.

Answer 12

I have to also voice my opinion and I feel this is a bad move.  Categories are now positioned at the very bottom where they become irrelevant. At least move them in a somewhat more visible location.

Katie Goodwin showed a nice alternative.

Answer 13

I have gone through and read all the comments and answers given. It seems the majority of wikitreers aren't mad about moving the categories from above the Biography section. They are mad that they have been put all the way at the bottom of the page with no prominence whatsoever and leaving only a very tiny Categories link at the top right of the porfile. Many have suggested they be moved and placed underneath the sources section and make the categories link a bit larger. I like this idea. I am like everyone else that likes them not above Biography, but think they were moved to the wrong place.

Another thought would be to have them be to the right of the page like the followed tags on our own profiles. Not really sure how that would work as far as the coding is concerned, but it would look great there. For our personal profiles it could go under the followed tags before the dna section. Categories are used much like our followed tags. This would put them out of the way of the profiles Biography and Sources section, but still in the view of people who use them and people coming on wikitree and looking at profiles that may not be members yet. I have also, like a few have mentioned, been told that wikitree is a little complicated and hard to navigate. Thank goodness for our Greeters and mentors that send links to these newbies and answer questions to try to help them along. I know when I was greeting, I got a lot of these questions, especially from older people who are not computer savy. I had a few that finally told me that it was just too complicated and they would stick to where they were currently.  So keeping them in view would be helpful. Then there would be no use for a clickable categories link. Also if you didn't want to have but say 5 showing then have a clickable more link that would show the rest of them. Most people know what the more link would be for, so it would not be confusing.

Anyway, that is just my thought. I know you all are working hard to make wikitree the best it can be and I am very thankful that you are working towards that goal. This is really the only change that I haven't liked in its entirety, well, except the new privacy laws stuff, but that wasn't a wikitree problem it was a international law issue that could not be avoided. So keep up the great work and hopefully we can come to a reasonable solution to the issue at hand.

Answer 14

Wasn't tracking this and it threw me at first (thought there was a glitch). The reasoning sounds fine, though I also agree that the present location in exile will likely reduce use of categories (which would diminish one important dimension of the wiki approach)

Here's a question: why not have the categories back in the old location but "hidden" by default, with a "Show categories" click-on where the "Categories" click-on is now. Then by clicking that you see all the categories above the bio with a "Hide categories" click-on to close them out again. Kind of a quantum solution (both there and not there). Was this discussed? Is it technically feasible?

Comments

Entirely feasible from the tech side, we already have show/hide Contents prior to the narrative bio.

Answer 15

Hi Michael,

We closely examined the two options: either 1.) keeping categories in their old location and having a toggle button to display them, as you suggested, or 2.) moving them as we did.

What pushed us over the edge to #2 is the potential SEO benefits. Categories are important for search engine optimization. They help Google semantically understand a page, and thereby help our profiles rank more highly in search results. Keeping categories in a logical place for navigation -- and exactly paralleling Wikipedia -- helps ensure that the categories are properly interpreted by Google.

Chris

commented 5 days ago by Chris Whitten G2G Astronaut

OK Chris, 

If I'm understanding what you are saying correctly then dumping the categories where you did is actually going to make the categories pop up on Google searches better? Is that correct?

Let's do an experiment together! 

As of this date, a google search for 'Casalvecchio Di Puglia' yeilds a hit on the very first page for  https://www.italiangenealogy.com/forum/locations-in-italy/42017  which is where I've spent time building that post and filling it with innumerable links to wikitree to try to lure cousins to take a look and just maybe join wikitree.

After looking through 10 additional pages, there are ZERO hits for the category for that town here on the wikitree site.

How long  do you want/need for this experiment to run before I should start seeing the category here come up on Google after this optimization?  A Month? Two?

Comments

I have regularly come across categories in Google searches, what shows up is NOT the profiles they are including but the actual categories themselves.  One click takes us to them, and we can continue exploring from there.  So I think this explanation of moving categories to the bottom of the page to more easily find them in Google searches is fallacious.

Answer 16

With the categories now at the bottom of the page, there may be an increase of incomplete new categories. I always add the cemetery category when I know it, and it usually appears in red at the top of the biography if something was misspelled or if the category does not yet exist. It would be better if "red" categories still appear at the top of the biography as a warning.

Comments

As of this morning, I have noticed no increase in wanted "red-linked" categories. In fact, the numbers remain about the same.

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Glad to hear the numbers are about the same. Last night, I had a red-linked category and didn't catch it until I went in later to update the profile. Then I got the red box warning at the top of the page that there was a category problem. Just as long as there is something that helps to catch the errors as we go along, things should be fine.

Answer 17

Wikitree moves on,as it always must, but I think it is a shame to have lost the categories to the bottom of the page.   As a few people have said, the category are now completely lost in a profile page and their value to users will diminish as a result.   Is there another way to tidy things up while not losing the benefit of having categories more easy to find?

Comments

I suggested here that the categories be moved to the top of the *right* profile column, above the DNA section, and above the tag section if it exists.  That would allow the bio to appear as high as possible in the left main column, where everyone seems to want it, and allow immediate visibility to all of the categories.  (And no link needed.)

Answer 18

I am very happy that the categories have been moved to the bottom.  It makes the biographies look so much better and the link makes it easy to get to the categories if needed.

Answer 19

The more I deal with the new category placement, the more I hate it.  The frustration just doesn't go away.  I hope you are working on a fix for this.  Please.

Answer 20

Thanks Chris, this does help to clean up profiles that might have numerous categories. But the "categories" link is so small. Visitors may not even see it. For some profiles, the Category is a very important feature. Can the symbol be changed to something larger - perhaps:

[Profile Category Project]

or something a little more visible?