Problem: Categories are a powerful tool to search pages. However, category pages only show the page's name, and there's a single sorting method, which reduces their usefulness.
Who would benefit: Readers and editors alike.
Proposed solution: Category pages should have an option to select the sorting type, for example category tag, page name, file size, first edit date, last edit date, number of editions, and page views. These values must be displayed of course.
@Kenraiz: I have merged your very similar proposal here. Hope that's okay! A copy the other proposal:
Problem: Content of Commons categories is displayed now in alphabetical order. Only. I wish we could sort content according to: size of file; date of file (chronological and on an annual basis - useful for landscapes and nature); type of file (extensions), number of uses of files.
Who would benefit: All users who need to find specific file in large categories.
Proposed solution: ?
More comments:
Phabricator tickets:
Proposer: Kenraiz (talk) 01:07, 26 November 2020 (UTC)
Categories are a weird realm in that they're ostensibly for readers, but de facto used mostly by editors. As a reader, the thing I'd really like to see long-term is a merging of categories and lists, such that it'd be possible to sort by things like date of birth for a people list. The more page metadata-related sorting functions proposed here would be useful for me as an editor, but if this gains support, I'd want to see it implemented in a way that doesn't add clutter for readers, who aren't very likely to want to sort by last edit date. {{u|Sdkb}}talk04:51, 9 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I'm increasingly of the mind that the best way to handle "categories" on Wikipedia is with Wikidata. Rather than create some fixed methods of sorting our cumbersome and strange tagging system, allow for easier (and limited, for the purpose of usability) querying of Wikidata to do everything. If you build a system on Wikidata queries, supply it with a set of properties it can use, then it would take less effort to just change those properties down the road than to modify the way mediawiki runs category pages. Categories on Commons, however, serve a rather more fundamental purpose at the moment, so it may be worth it for there, but I'm still kind of skeptical. — Rhododendritestalk \\ 13:46, 9 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Neutral oppose as it pertains to Wikipedia, not because I think it's a bad idea (anything to make categories more useful than they are), but because I don't think it's smart to invest more resources in an awkward system that should just be replaced/exported entirely per what I wrote above. On Commons it would fill a more imminent need (on Wikipedia, we wikilink to various pages, have lists, etc. -- on Commons, file and category pages are about all we have as nobody uses galleries) but with the introduction of structured data on Commons it's possible that's better served by Wikidata, too. — Rhododendritestalk \\ 13:46, 9 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Support As long as it is feasible server load wise at the moment. Otherwise I guess this can be solved by gadgets for smaller categories, or by some tool for the bigger ones. Base (talk) 20:32, 17 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Support Stryn (talk) 18:24, 8 December 2020 (UTC)
Neutral oppose as it pertains to Wikipedia, not because I think it's a bad idea (anything to make categories more useful than they are), but because I don't think it's smart to invest more resources in an awkward system that should just be replaced/exported entirely per what I wrote above. On Commons it would fill a more imminent need (on Wikipedia, we wikilink to various pages, have lists, etc. -- on Commons, file and category pages are about all we have as nobody uses galleries) but with the introduction of structured data on Commons it's possible that's better served by Wikidata, too. — Rhododendrites talk \\ 13:46, 9 December 2020 (UTC)
