[hyperpallium]

I think an aspect of the problem is that wikipedia has become a highly technical reference rather than a traditional encyclopedia for a layperson to educate themselves. e.g. Articles often swamp the basic idea with myriad qualifications and connections to other topics.

There's demand for both levels.

I'd also like a wikitorial or wikixtbook... taking a layperson through to solid understanding but I suppose something like Khan is what's needed for that role.

BTW I've found wolfram often better than wikipedia for maths topics.

[MayeulC]

I agree that there is a demand for both levels. That's why there is also a "Simple English" version of this page. [1]

I agree that discoverability of this feature can be hard, though.

I also miss the fact that this feature is only available to the English language. There could be a "simple article" feature built into the website, I think.

[1] https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Factorization

[hyperpallium]

Ah! Right on all counts. I have come across this feature before... but (eg) looking at the ordinary wiki page for factorization, I'm not seeing a link to it...

So, to access the user-friendly, non-technical, layperson version is simple, all you need is to know how to edit the url... that's wot you call ironic, that is.

EDIT It's not even linked under "see also"... ok, your remark on it being only english was a tip-off... it's counted as the language "simple english", and is available under the language icon (a funny looking "A" on the left... which I would never have guessed was for languages). I can see that'a a very easy hack to add an alternate version of a page, since that's what languages are already... but IMHO, layperson versions of a page (or even for experts, wanting to just get the gist) are an essential part of wikipedia's mission and purpose.

Re: simple versions in other languages: they could use the same hack, and have (eg) "simple french", "simple japanese" etc, but because it's so important, I'd suggest another explicit level, something like "https://simple.en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Factorization" (BTW that's also a mobile url, since I'm on a phone... I'd say, "simple" is just as important).

I understand wikipedia reached a level of completion a few years back, and the organization consequentally changed in character. A push for simple versions of everything coukd revitalize it.

[demonshalo]

what the f... is this sorcery?! this thing exists? O_o

If anything, this should be promoted and slapped on every page as a big green button!

[tonyarkles]

I feel weird posting this link, because I was relatively old when Wikipedia became a thing and still remember what "real" encyclopedias were like.

https://www.britannica.com/topic/algebra/Applications-of-gro...

> Some other fundamental concepts of modern algebra also had their origin in 19th-century work on number theory, particularly in connection with attempts to generalize the theorem of (unique) prime factorization beyond the natural numbers. This theorem asserted that every natural number could be written as a product of its prime factors in a unique way, except perhaps for order (e.g., 24 = 2∙2∙2∙3).

That seems like a pretty good first step to me.