mahara-contributors team mailing list archive

[Richard Mansfield <884444@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

See also the related bug #898923, which fixes the copying problem for
navigation blocks within a single collection.

I recently commented on a similar request to this via email, so I'll add
my opinion on this bug report too.

I'd prefer to see the "giant" collections feature addressed by
implementing something more along the lines of the "multipage views"
specifications here:

https://wiki.mahara.org/index.php/Developer_Area/Specifications_in_Development/Multipage_Views
https://wiki.mahara.org/index.php/Developer_Area/Specifications_in_Development/Multipage_Views_Take_2

Those are just ordinary collections, like we have at present, except
that you can create hierarchical navigation between pages in a
collection, rather than just a flat list.

The advantage of doing it that way is that we already have existing code
for copying collections, and for ensuring all pages inside a collection
have the same access rights.  Adding another layer for collections of
collections would (a) require reimplementing all that work to keep
everything sane at the higher level, and (b) unnecessarily restrict the
number of levels in the collection navigation menu to two.

Navigation blocks should probably never have been allowed to point to
any collection apart from the one they're inside, because this leads to
broken links if users aren't careful - it allows navigation blocks to
point at deleted collections or collections with different access rights
to the one containing the navigation block.  Penny's specification for
multipage views makes that point too - she says navigation blocks don't
need to be configurable at all (they just automatically create
navigation for the collection they're in).  Unfortunately it's a bit
late to change this now without annoying the people who are using it as
a workaround.

Rather than creating a second explicit level of collections, the other
possibility hinted at in this bug report is to make "giant" collections
implicit, by doing some magic during collection copying to find and
follow all the navigation blocks, and copy any additional collections
that are pointed at in those blocks.  However, this has all the problems
with inconsistencies in the access rights, navigation blocks for deleted
collections, and navigation blocks pointing at other peoples'
collections due to bug #898923.  It also creates additional work in the
UI to let users choose whether they want to copy a single page on its
own, or an entire collection, or the "giant" collection.  It also seems
wrong to make the existence of a navigation block on a particular page
imply something about which collections are contained within other
collections.

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https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/884444

Title:
  Giant collections needed on page copying

Status in Mahara ePortfolio:
  Triaged

Bug description:
  Collections which are navigation blocks on a page should allow copying
  and editing of the collections

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