[wp-testers] Center

Bruce Hartman bruce at brucehartman.net
Thu Mar 27 18:22:49 GMT 2008 

I'd like to signal my agreement with Dirk's take on the situation.

> -----Original Message-----
> From: wp-testers-bounces at lists.automattic.com 
> [mailto:wp-testers-bounces at lists.automattic.com] On Behalf Of 
> Dirk Hohndel
> Sent: Thursday, March 27, 2008 12:55 PM
> To: wp-testers at lists.automattic.com
> Subject: Re: [wp-testers] Center
> 
> 
> User interface design has been researched a lot over the last 
> decade.  
> And many, many, many of the choices made in the redesign of 
> the WP user interface go squarely against the results of that 
> research.
> 
> - unintuitive links:
>    -- "editing a comment by clicking on the author's name" 
> (that should get you somewhere related to this author, not to 
> this specific
> comment)
>    -- "editing your profile by clicking on your user name" 
> (that is not quite as weird, but still, it's not intuitive)
>    -- a "Manage" link that allows you to manage lots of very 
> different things, but not comments
> - bad screen layout
>    -- yes, a maximum width is good, but then it needs to 
> apply to EVERYTHING - so the "Howdy <user> | Log Out..." and 
> the "Settings Plugins Users" also need to be bound by the 
> width - otherwise they become invisible to the user
>    -- top level menu items are in three locations 
> ("Dashboard" at the very top, "Write, Manage, Design..." a 
> little below, "Settings, Plugins, Users" on the right
>    -- there are two items named Dashboard on the screen (or 
> put differently, Dashboard is a submenu of Dashboard)
> - bad minimum requirements (why can't I use the wp-admin pages from a
> Blackberry?)
> - really hard to use with a text based browser (which means 
> that you create lots of problems for blind people)
> 
> 
> Every time one of us criticizes the new design we are told 
> how hard the team tried and how much work went into it. Look. 
> The team writing Windows Vista tried really hard and a lot of 
> work went into it. It still sucks. Same goes for lots of 
> other software. In open source usually software gets better 
> BECAUSE the constant feedback of the community is taken 
> seriously. I don't feel that our feedback is taken seriously 
> at all - most if not all of the things I list above have been 
> reported over and over again, yet nothing has changed.
> 
> The user interface of 2.5 is a CLEAR STEP BACKWARDS. And 
> saying that this will be "fixed in 2.6 if enough users 
> complain" is just ridiculous. Why make it worse to begin with???
> 
> (just to be fair, there are new features that I love - like 
> the media upload thingy; it also has usability issues (why 
> does "insert into post" close the window if I just uploaded 
> multiple pictures? Makes no sense), but it's a huge step forward)
> 
> /D
> 
> On Mar 26, 2008, at 11:41 PM, DD32 wrote:
> > On Thu, 27 Mar 2008 17:14:13 +1100, deliciousdays 
> > <oliver.seidel at deliciousdays.com
> > > wrote:
> >
> >> I agree, the 980px limitation in width is not good *to say 
> the least* 
> >> and the fact that a 'plugin' is offered to overwrite this 
> CSS setting 
> >> is a joke, right?!
> >> No offense intended D, but I'm getting more and more 
> frustrated with 
> >> many of the recent design and UI decisions.
> >
> > None taken at all, The way i see it though, Is that the 
> design choice 
> > has been made for the 2.5 release, I dont agree with it, I might as 
> > well offer a plugin to change it. Theres a few things i dont agree 
> > with the new interface, but its not worth going into them all.
> >
> > The feedback given will be what steers the UI changes, 
> Theres been a 
> > remarkably small number of complaints about the width from 
> what i've 
> > seen, which means most people who have been testing dont mind that 
> > much. Most feedback on the changes have been positive, So 
> its either 
> > people like it, They dont care, or they dont complain.
> >
> > If once 2.5 is released, and theres a huge backlash of 
> users wanting 
> > their fluid back, then feedback may dictate a change to be made.
> >
> > If those who want the fluid design back, feel strong enough 
> about it, 
> > go rate it: http://wordpress.org/extend/ideas/topic.php?id=1291
> > Might as well collate the votes somewhere.
> >
> >> To a point where I simply don't care and am happy (and already
> >> have) to
> >> apply my own admin CSS theme with JS driven menu tabs.
> >>
> >> But why not spend more time on fixing real issues than 
> trying so hard 
> >> to come up with a different UI, that seems to be put together 
> >> 'on-the- fly'.
> >
> > To be fair, HappyCog( http://www.happycog.com/ ) did put a fair 
> > ammount of effort into the new design, And based it around a lot of 
> > user research, Put together some wireframe mockups of a better 
> > interface, And piece by piece, the Devs have done a great job of 
> > implementing the changes, and improving WP in so many other ways at 
> > the same time.
> >
> > WP 2.5 also includes the ability for Plugins to overrule the Admin 
> > theme all together, So i'd expect to see a few spinoffs 
> which improve 
> > upon the current design, If the changes are popular enough, 
> then i'm 
> > sure Devs would consider pulling those changes into the core.
> > Once you've used the 2.5 admin for awhile, Its much 
> comfier, if you've 
> > just changed over from the old interface, then its going to 
> take some 
> > time to get your grips on it, As expected.
> >
> > All i'm trying to say, Is give it a chance before writing it off 
> > entirely.
> >
> > There'll allways be people who do *not* want to change,
> >
> > There'll be people claiming the old interface is better, and
> > *nothing* will change their minds,
> > There'll be people who like it, but dont agree with some 
> aspects, and 
> > there'll be those who love it,
> >
> > Those 3 groups of people are expected, Theres people who absolutely 
> > hate the old interface, Theres people who liked it, but found it 
> > cumbersome, or felt it was time for a change, and theres people who 
> > loved it.
> >
> > Point is, nothing much has changed, its just the people may have 
> > switched group.
> >
> > So, If someone doesnt like a current design choice, Voice 
> it, get it 
> > known, Who knows, Fluid width might be back in 2.5.1
> >
> >> O
> >>
> >> PS: Someone somewhere wrote "WP is the new Windows" - I hope not.
> >>
> >>
> >> DD32 wrote:
> >>> Aparantly most people prefer a thin content frame rather than a 
> >>> fluid content frame.
> >>>
> >>> Personally, If i want my content thin, i resize the 
> browser window.
> >>>
> >>> I wrote up a plugin to remove the maximum width if you 
> would like to 
> >>> try a full width admin.
> >>> http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/remove-max-width/
> >>>
> >>> D
> >>>
> >>> On Thu, 27 Mar 2008 09:06:49 +1100, Eric Amundson 
> >>> <sewmyheadon at gmail.com
> >>> > wrote:
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>> On 03/26/2008 Vladimir Vuckovic wrote:
> >>>>
> >>>>> I don't know is this bug, but I'm running my computer 
> on 1280x960 
> >>>>> pixels and I notice that whole WordPress 2.5 (which is so
> >>>>> amazing) is
> >>>>> on the left align, not centered or streched 100%... I 
> think that 
> >>>>> it's better to be in whole window, not only on the left and 
> >>>>> there's a lot of blank space at the right...
> >>>>>
> >>>>> Thanks,
> >>>>> Vladimir
> >>>>>
> >>>> Hi Vladimir,
> >>>>
> >>>> I'm running on a few monitors - both wide screens.
> >>>>
> >>>> I think if you look closer, the header and footer expand to fill 
> >>>> the width of the browser, no matter what the width.
> >>>>
> >>>> The 'body' of the admin panel, which is wrapped in a div 
> >>>> class="wrap"
> >>>> has a max-width of 980px, which is likely to spare the 
> design from 
> >>>> breaking or becoming too hard to read (excessive line lengths), 
> >>>> when maximized on wider screens.
> >>>>
> >>>> I like this a lot and rarely maximize my browser anyway 
> on a wider 
> >>>> screen.
> >>>>
> >>>> eric
> >>>> _______________________________________________
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> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
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