Clarify the FCKeditor configuration settings in MediaWiki

[Mike]

The current configuration settings for the "rich editor" (in the Misc tab of a MediaWiki install) are named in a way that creates significant confusion:

• does "Disable rich editor" override any and all of the "Disable rich editor within the xxx namespace" settings?
• Does "Start with rich editor disabled" mean "Start editing each page with the native Mediawiki editor", or "start each logged-in session with the rich editor disabled"?
• Does "Remember last toggle state" have any effect except as a modifier to "Use toggle to switch between..."?
• Do "Use toggle to switch between..." and/or "Remember last toggle state" settings get persisted for all pages, or does each page start with a default setting that gets changed independently of any other page's changes?

Recommendations:

1. Rename "Disable rich editor" to "Disable rich editor (site-wide setting, overrides all other rich editor settings)".

2. Group & format all the "Disable rich editor within the ... namespace" settings in such a way that it's apparent they're just subordinate to the "Disable rich editor" setting. e.g. you could place all these subordinate checkboxes directly after the "Disable rich editor" checkbox, and indent the text for each of the checkbox labels a few spaces each. e.g. you could wrap all the "Disable rich editor..." checkboxes inside a Groupbox-like control (such as you see on the Search tab of the user's MediaWiki preferences)

3. Add an extra CR (<br>) spacer or two between the rest of the Misc configuration items and the "rich editor" configuration items (such as is used on the Watchlist tab of the user's MediaWiki settings, between the second and third configuration items).

4. Rename "Start with rich editor disabled" to "Start editing each page with the rich editor disabled" - assuming that's what this actually means.

5. For the two "toggle" settings, indent the second setting (to indicate it's a modifier of the first) and/or surround them with a Groupbox. This should increase the association between the two settings, and make it clear that one modifies the other.

Thank you in advance for your consideration.

[Wiktor Walc]

Your comments sound very reasonable, feel free to propose a patch that clarifies all settings.

[Mike]

OK, I'll give it a shot, but first I'll need to know where to find the file(s) that affect these configuration settings. I'm not terribly familiar with the layout of the source code - e.g. which project (FCKeditor or MediaWiki) hosts the MW configuration settings content, and where in the trunk I should look for the latest file(s).

Thanks - a few breadcrumbs will lead me a long way (I believe).

[Wiktor Walc]

• Main site of the project: ​http://mediawiki.fckeditor.net/
• SVN: ​http://svn.fckeditor.net/MediaWiki/trunk
• SVN instructions: ​http://mediawiki.fckeditor.net/index.php/SVN_Instructions

Messages are in FCKeditor.i18n.en.php. Toggles are added by function onUserToggles() located in FCKeditor.body.php. Toggles are added using the UserToggles hook: ​http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:Hooks/UserToggles so I'm not sure if there will be an easy way to format them exactly like you suggested.

[Jakub Ś]

FCKeditor was retired and is no longer supported. All active development was moved to its successor, ​CKEditor 3.x, that is a fully mature and far superior product. We recommend you upgrade as soon as possible.