Type: UserInterface
Author: dmitrig01

Ever think Drupal is hard to use? The task is to find out where, and to improve it. The task is to find two (2) pages with bad usability, and suggest two ways to improve them.

The steps are as follows:

* Install Drupal
* Play around a bit
* Find two pages that are hard to use
* Consult the primary contact on whether they are "the way Drupal works" or actual usability problems
* Repeat until you have two
* Suggest and mock up ways to improve both of those pages

The final deliverable will be an annotated screenshot and/or mockup in the form of the "Sample mockup" listed below, along with suggested improvements, posted to and reviewed by a member of the Drupal Usability group.

Resources:

* Usability group: http://groups.drupal.org/usability
* Sample mockup: http://drupal.org/files/issues/3-term-form.png

Estimated time:

2-4 days

Support from Acquia helps fund testing for Drupal Acquia logo

Comments

snufkin’s picture

Status: Active » Postponed (maintainer needs more info)
webchick’s picture

Title: #54: Find two (2) hard to use Drupal administration pages and suggest ways to improve them » GHOP #54 : Find two (2) hard to use Drupal administration pages and suggest ways to improve them
Project: Google Highly Open Participation Contest (GHOP) »
Component: GHOP Task » usability
TimRogersCool’s picture

Hey, I'm TimRogersCool and I'm assigned to this task. It says in the briefing that I should consult the community over where an issue is "the way Drupal works" or an actual usability issue.

I've been looking around this evening, and I've currently found 1 page which is slightly confusing for the end user. On "/admin/user/rules/add" the use of the word "mask" is likely to be confusing to some people. Perhaps it would be sensible to make it change the text where it says "Mask:" to a different label, for example if you choose the "Email" radio button it would change the label to "Email address:". Additionally, the use of the word Host might be confusing because people would think that was something to do with their hosting company. Perhaps a better alternative would be to say "Hostname:" and have an option to lookup an IP address' hostname from within the page.

webchick’s picture

That's a good idea. We could use some jQuery mojo to change the title when one of the radio buttons is clicked.

The only problem with that is on admin/user/rules, the column heading is "Mask" there. Can you think of a better generic word for "E-mail address/Hostname/Etc."? :)

TimRogersCool’s picture

Sorry, didn't mean to post it so many times.

TimRogersCool’s picture

Sorry, didn't mean to post it so many times.

TimRogersCool’s picture

Perhaps the word "filter" would be more appropriate - it's less technical, more people are likely to understand and it can't be confused with subnet mask. Agreed? If so, shall I begin my mockup?

webchick’s picture

Thanks for the follow-up, Tim. Really sorry; I thought I had responded to this already. That sounds like a good idea to me. :)

TimRogersCool’s picture

OK, I will do the mockup. Am I correct to believe that I need to find another problematic page?

TimRogersCool’s picture

FileSize
258.87 KB

Here is the first mockup. Do I need to find another page and do another one?

webchick’s picture

Status: Postponed (maintainer needs more info) » Needs review

Yep, the task calls for two different pages, so we need another mock up.

Nice job on the first one though, marking for review.

Are you a coder-type? :) Have any interest in rolling a small patch to fix the above problems you found? We can walk you through it in #drupal-ghop on irc.freenode.net if you'd like! (although not right at this very moment cos I'm going to bed :D)

TimRogersCool’s picture

I'm a coder-type, and I wouldn't mind doing it ;) I'll get to work on my second mockup - I'll idle on #drupal-ghop. My nick is TimRogersCool, PM me when you're around.

TimRogersCool’s picture

Status: Needs review » Needs work
FileSize
2.07 KB

With guidance from people on IRC, I've made a patch which fixed some of the things mentioned. Unfortunately, we were having problems with the jQuery so the Javascript changing of the "Filter" label is not working. Please fix this if possible. I am gonna do my second mockup.

TimRogersCool’s picture

FileSize
309.53 KB

Here is my second mockup. If it's alright, that's my task done!

trevortwining’s picture

Hey Tim, great work and thanks for your contributions!

I think your analysis of the rules page is good, and the wording makes sense.

The only comment I have about the Add User screen is your recommendation to change 'Blocked' to 'Inactive';

I like the way that the two words pair themselves. However, Blocked has the implication that the account has been turned off deliberately, while Inactive seems to imply a more passive reason for deactivation.

I tried to think of some words that might be better, and the only one I could come up with is 'Disabled.'

Thanks again, and I hope this bit of feedback helps.

TimRogersCool’s picture

Is the task complete? Would you like me to update the mockup?

keith.smith’s picture

TimRogersCool: How do you feel about rolling some more patches for the items you point out in #14? Your patch in #13 looks pretty good, but will get buried here if we pile more unrelated issues on top of it, so you may need to search the Drupal issue queue to see if another issue looks close to what you are proposing, and offer a patch there, or if not, create a new issue with a patch. You could include all your issues in #14 in a single patch, as far as I see.

Your comment about the * noting that a field required, but not explicitly saying so is well taken, but that's going to be a problem on a lot of pages (any page that has a required field). We'd need a general way of solving this, rather than adding the a note to the bottom of each individual page. And, of course, when a user submits the form without filling in a required field, they do get a form validation error.

Dries’s picture

There are some great suggestions in the mockup. Let's roll some patches for these.

Anonymous’s picture

Project: » Drupal core
Version: » 7.x-dev
Sutharsan’s picture

Issue tags: +GHOP

Moving issues from User experience project to Drupal core usability component.

aspilicious’s picture

Version: 7.x-dev » 8.x-dev
Component: usability » base system

String freeze in D7 but I do like the idea of rewriting some strings in D8, like blocked to inactive...

yoroy’s picture

Issue tags: +Usability

tag

jhedstrom’s picture

Issue summary: View changes
Issue tags: +Needs issue summary update

Not sure if this can be closed out or not...if not, the summary should be updated.

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