launchpad-dev team mailing list archive

[Christian Robottom Reis <kiko@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Thu, Aug 06, 2009 at 01:13:02PM -0400, Curtis Hovey wrote:
> > What is the deciding factor for whether an action can be placed in the
> > main content? Is the Related Pages menu supposed to be in the main
> > content or the sidebar? Can you provide an example of the contents of
> > the two menus for an overview page, an edit page, and a bugs page for
> > a single object?
> 
> The action menu is for actions that change the context object. Many
> objects do have content to place a link near. Common examples in the 2.0
> UI is Change details and Administer. Recent examples are Change password
> and Change visibility (pubic/private). Since these links modify the
> context object, they will probably only appear on the context's index
> page. Something is wrong if:
> 
>       * The menu shows up on many pages
>       * The menu has more than 3 links (experience may change this
>         number)
>       * The link does not modify the context

Mostly agreeing but elaborating on Curtis' answer since he didn't
actually provide any examples <wink> I think the decision of where to
put a link is actually pretty easy if the idea behind the actions menu
is "links in the actions menu are all the links that manipulate
something that isn't intuitively identifiable on the page." The page
context is one such thing, since it is represented by the page itself.

This implies that links /may/ disappear from the actions menu once the
content of the pages changes. As an example scenario:

    Pristine bug, just reported. There is no content saying "This bug is
    NOT a duplicate" on the page.  The actions menu contains a "Mark as
    duplicate" link.

    Duplicate bug. There is content on the page that clearly says "This
    bug is a duplicate". There is a link on that content with the text
    "Undo this". There is no "Unmark as duplicate" link in the actions
    menu.

I realize this is controversial; however, the alternatives are also
controversial (no actions menu, placing links randomly -- see current
mark as duplicate link, having links appear in menu /and/ in content),
so I'd like us to accept to actually try this approach for 3.0 and adapt
once we get actual user feedback.

I will give you an example of how /I/ would like the bugs page to work:

    Pristine bug, just reported

        Actions Menu
            - Mark bug as duplicate
            - Convert bug to question
            - Mentor someone to fix this bug
            - View bug activity log
                (as I think the current location is random)
            - Add tags to bug
                (unless we had content that looked like this
                    Tags: (edit)
                 in the main page, which changed to
                    Tags: amorphous (edit)
                once tags were added -- no floating Add tags link in
                other words)
            - Link bug to Bazaar branch (note the branding)
                (again, unless there was content that said
                    There are no Bazaar branches related to this bug
                    (link branch)
                 in which case there would be an obvious place to put
                 the link)
            - Link bug to CVE
                (again, similar example)
            - This bug affects me to
                (unless there is a clear piece of content, for instance,
                filled or outlined flames indicating how many users are
                affected by this bug; in this case I'd put the "I am
                affected too!" button close to that)
            - Forward this bug via email (yes, non-implemented feature)

    I would also <noscript> the Update description/tags link, which is
    unnecessary for JS browsers.

In summary I think this means that if there is no obvious place to put
the link, either there's content missing or the link goes into the
actions portlet.

For a Team page, the actions portlet would probably contain 

    Change team information
        (details, registration.. not sure, all the words are vague)
    Create a new poll for this team
    Create a mailing list for this team
        (unless the team already has a mailing list)
    Add new member to team
        (In this case there /is/ related content, but I doubt people
         adding members to team actually look at the counts of members
         etc in https://dev.launchpad.net/TeamIndexPage when going to
         add a member; they peck and hunt like me)

Note the use of long (but clearer) text for the links; I think it needs
to be obvious what the link in the menu does.

Note also that Edwin asks for an example for a +edit page. Do +edit
pages actually need actions menus? I would think they would just point
you back to the page for the content you were +editing. And one day,
+edit pages will all be gone anyway!
-- 
Christian Robottom Reis | [+55 16] 3376 0125 | http://launchpad.net/~kiko
                        | [+55 16] 9112 6430 | http://async.com.br/~kiko