Make publishing deliberate
under review
Zuzu Typ
Currently, all pages are published by default. You can flip the switch to deliberately un-publish a page. This is backwards to how it should be. A page should not be published by default, but rather published deliberately by command of the user (either by flipping the switch, or using an appropriate button labelled something like "Publish").
I have the following use-case: I work in a team with multiple developers. We use wiki.js to create documentation for our product. Since we work on it in parallel, we also have to each create different parts of a given page of documentation. Our customer only has read access to the wiki and thus can only see published pages. It would make a lot of sense for us to publish a page when its ready, not having to remember marking it as un-ready when creating it.
Sahil Shah
I feel like this would be covered by the Page Approval Function that is In Progress (https://requarks.canny.io/wiki/p/page-approval-function). Really, it would be more like the responsibility of an editor than preparer of the document. If no approver, that auto-publishing happens.
Ryan Johnson
No, I highly disagree with this. A page should be published by default, given the current UI metaphors available. The UI will need to make it very clear that a page is not active, otherwise noob contributors to a wiki will be making a ton of unpublished pages and assuming they're published. A wiki isn't intended to be like a personal website/WordPress. Don't try to force those metaphors into this context, and do think about the worst-case scenario of a user's observational skills.
Zuzu Typ
Ryan Johnson: No, a page should only be published by default if you don't need unpublished pages in the first place. As Nicolas said, this should be an optional feature. Therefore, it wouldn't bother you. Also, if the feature was turned on, I would imagine there being an alternate button to saving, labelled "save and publish" or "publish". That way it's obvious to anyone that they have the choice to save the page as a draft or publish it. Currently, "noob" users won't even know that saving their page as a draft is even possible at all. So very much on the contrary, this feature has the potential of improving usability for "noob" contributors.
TheMet4lGod
Zuzu Typ The way I get around the draft pages being live is similar to how it's done in a regular Wiki: save them somewhere else (i.e.,
/en/drafts/pageName
) and then just set up rules that only editors can view anything in /drafts
. Once done, just copy and paste into the existing page and delete the draft. To make an edit of an existing page, just duplicate it to /en/drafts
.
Nicolas Giard
under review
That would definitely be an optional toggle and off by default. Most users don't want an extra step to publish a page.
Zuzu Typ
Nicolas Giard: I agree that it should be optional, however, it doesn't have to be an extra step. Most tools that have publishing as a feature offer it as an alternative button to saving, such as "save and publish" or simply "publish", in addition to another "publish"-button in read mode (not requiring you to switch to edit mode first). That way there isn't inherently an extra step (or multiple ones) and it's a lot more obvious that the user is making a deliberate decision. If a user doesn't need the publishing feature, they likely also won't need a toggle to un-publish a page, so by making "publishing" an optional feature, it removes clutter from the UI.
Tim Elmer
This should probably be configurable. The second you make publishing a checkbox, you'll have users in other environments complaining about their pages not getting published.
jk
💯