12 Sep
2013
12 Sep
'13
1:38 p.m.
Hi,
Generally speaking if we add a menu located next to the existing page/space/wiki menus it
cannot be a menu representing a wiki since it's not logical (there's already a
wiki level menu). It has to represent something bigger than a wiki. That's the System,
aka XWiki, aka Portal.
Home wouldn't make sense since it would mean having all the menu entries that you
normally find in the wiki menu and that's distriburing and there's no reason to
have shortcuts for those when you are in a subwiki (if you wish to administer the main
wiki for example, you can navigate to the main wiki, it's not so often that you need
to administer the main wiki when you're on a subwiki that you need a shortcut for
it!). As guillaume said below, if we do this we also have duplicated menus when you're
in the main wiki and if you decide to not show it when you're on the main wiki then
you have a solution that's not uneven since it means visually different menus when on
the main wiki and when on a subwiki which isn't nice. It's much better to have a
menu entry that stays wherver you're located. The notion of System/XWiki/Portal allows
for this.
Note 1: I'm personally fine to have the System/XWiki/Portal menu located on the left
too if everyone wants that. It makes the menu system a bit crowded.
Note 2: This System menu could only appear when there's more than 1 wiki since we want
to make it as lightweight possible for single wiki users
Note 3: An option would be to have a switch in the Admin to enable wiki creation and not
base the appearance of the system menu and the Add>Wiki on whether there's 1 or
more subwikis.
So, based on this:
* Solution A: -1
* Solution B: +1 (I'm fine with having "System", "XWiki" or some
other names representing the whole system but not "Home" which doesn't
represent the system but the main wiki only. I'm also fine to move that menu on the
left)
* Solution C: -1
* Solution D: +1
Thanks
-Vincent
On Sep 12, 2013, at 12:31 PM, Guillaume Louis-Marie Delhumeau <gdelhumeau(a)xwiki.com>
wrote:
Hi developers.
Tuesday evening, after trying to fix all issues that integrate Workspace in
XE made, I had a bit of time to work on this JIRA:
http://jira.xwiki.org/browse/XWIKI-9341 "Menu improvements when Workspaces
activated".
The idea was to quickly implement the Caty's proposal for M2 (which was
scheduled for the day after). I made it and I sent a pull request. I have
also sent a mail to Vincent to show him my work.
== Proposal A ==
There is some screenshots (Proposal A):
Logged as admin:
http://xwiki.kephpage.net/proposals/workspaces-menus/new-home-menu.png
Not logged as admin:
http://xwiki.kephpage.net/proposals/workspaces-menus/new-home-menu-non-admi…
You can get it from this commit:
https://github.com/xwiki/xwiki-platform/commit/8c1c1bac2cde30f9024525e50249…
(except that I have changed the wiki icon for this screenshot)
We though this menu was confusing and not consistent with the current menus:
- Why do we have a link to the *main wiki* administration when we are in a
(sub)wiki? Does it make sense?
- Why do we have the main wiki (called Home) in the left of the current
wiki, space and page? The fact that there is actually a "main" and several
"sub" wikis is only due to the implementation. We could imagine, in the
future, a new implementation where there is no distinction between "main"
and "sub", but where we have an independent "system" that allows the
users
to create and manage their wikis. Then, it seems better to call the menu
"System" or "XWiki".
- When we don't have the admin right on the main wiki, we only have a
single item in this menu, meanwhile wiki, space and page has more content.
It does not look good.
- If you are in the main wiki, you have "Administer main wiki" twice: once
in the Home menu, once in the Wiki menu.
- The left menu has too many items.
== Proposal B ==
Vincent thought it was not good enough to be integrated in 5.2M2, so we
started to iterate until having this proposal:
http://xwiki.kephpage.net/proposals/workspaces-menus/new-xwiki-menu.png(pro…
B).
Why putting this menu to the right side? It's because, on the left side, we
have Wiki/Space/Page, where you have actions that you can actually achieve
on these Wiki, Space and Page. Actions like "Administer", "Delete"
or
"Rename". The XWiki menu does not provide actions like that, it just
provides some shortcuts to navigate thought the wikis. It's more a
"System"
menu, like the Profile menu, or the Register action. That's why we put it
there. Moreover, it make the left menu smaller, which is less confusing.
== Proposal C ==
We had also this idea:
http://xwiki.kephpage.net/proposals/workspaces-menus/wiki-menu.png(proposal C)
But we didn't like it, because the "Wiki Directory" and the "Main
Wiki"
link are not related to the current wiki, meanwhile actions like
"Administer", "Index" or "Delete" are.
---
After having created the proposal B, I asked Vincent: "What should I do? Do
I commit it, without asking to the community?". He said yes, because he
wanted to have something to show to the community that can still be changed
for the RC1, and he applied the pull request.
So, let me list again the 3 proposals we have:
A - "Home" menu (Caty's proposal):
Current implementation:
http://xwiki.kephpage.net/proposals/workspaces-menus/new-home-menu.png
Mockup with the new skin:
http://incubator.myxwiki.org/xwiki/bin/download/Improvements/PortalMenu/Men…
B - "XWiki" right menu:
http://xwiki.kephpage.net/proposals/workspaces-menus/new-xwiki-menu.png
C - Add actions to the "Wiki" menu:
http://xwiki.kephpage.net/proposals/workspaces-menus/wiki-menu.png
I propose to start a thread where you can all give your opinion, regarding
one of these proposals, and you can also bring new ideas. We must have a
consensus for the RC1!
0 for proposal A (the left menu is too heavy).
+0 for proposal B (not perfect IMHO).
-1 for proposal C.
Louis-Marie
