Pruning the Threads subscriptions list

alakon - February 26, 2008 - 02:07
Project:Subscriptions
Version:6.x-1.x-dev
Component:User interface
Category:feature request
Priority:normal
Assigned:Unassigned
Status:active
Description

A few user interface suggestions:

  • The ability to "select all" of a particular node type to turn off those subscriptions in mass (in the user/x/subscriptions area).
  • The ability to turn off (both on a user and sitewide level) auto subscribe of nodes that have been voted on using VotingAPI
  • The ability to turn off (on a sitewide level) subscriptions of own's own content for a particular node type (IE- don't send e-mail when user updates their own usernode profile)
  • The ability to change-- on a sitewide level-- the subscriptions button. Perhaps comment fields can include a checkbox that allows the user to set subscriptions on or off.
  • Bookmarks Project-style AJAX that toggles between subscribe and unsubscribe
  • #1

    alakon - February 26, 2008 - 02:07
    Title:Improve "unsubscribe" user interface» A few user interface suggestions

    #2

    salvis - February 26, 2008 - 20:03

    Thank you for your suggestions. My general impression is that they reflect special needs that are outside of the mainstream.

    # The ability to "select all" of a particular node type to turn off those subscriptions in mass (in the user/x/subscriptions area).

    On which kinds of Subscriptions do you see this need? How would you design the GUI?

    # The ability to turn off (both on a user and sitewide level) auto subscribe of nodes that have been voted on using VotingAPI

    Why? What does VotingAPI do?

    # The ability to turn off (on a sitewide level) subscriptions of own's own content for a particular node type (IE- don't send e-mail when user updates their own usernode profile)

    Shouldn't the usernode content type be blocked?

    # The ability to change-- on a sitewide level-- the subscriptions button. Perhaps comment fields can include a checkbox that allows the user to set subscriptions on or off.

    "Change" into what?

    Since BETA11 we have a separate auto-subscribe setting on comments. I don't believe this is still needed.

    # Bookmarks Project-style AJAX that toggles between subscribe and unsubscribe

    If you want to implement it, we can pursue this.

    #3

    alakon - February 27, 2008 - 23:01

    Salvis,

    Let me start with the first suggestion, because I think it's most important.

    Imagine you are a active user of a social community site. You've authored two hundred nodes and you've replied to three hundred threads. So by default, you're subscribed to five hundred nodes, and even if you take a vacation for a week you'll get several updates a day. It gets overwhelming after a bit.

    Say you decide you'd just rather focus on replies to nodes you authored. Or just nodes of a particular taxonomy type that you really care about. Or you'd like to unsubscribe from nodes older that are older than a year.

    How do you do that?

    Well, even if you knew exactly what nodes you'd like to unsubscribe from, you'd have to sit down and spend an afternoon clicking on select buttons over and over and over... five hundred times.

    I absolutely think there's room for improvement.

    I'd be happy to make a mockup of how the user interface could look. Would you like me to give it a shot?

    Andrew

    #4

    salvis - February 28, 2008 - 03:00
    Title:A few user interface suggestions» Pruning the Threads subscriptions list

    If you're an active user, you may want to turn auto-subscribe off and instead subscribe by Content Type or Category. But I agree that over time the Thread subscriptions list tends to get long and longer.

    You originally suggested an unsubscribe by Type function, and I doubt that that would really help. Now you've broadened the scope, which I think is good, but it makes the UI even more difficult.

    Yes, please do post a mockup, and I invite everyone else to participate. And let's focus on pruning the Threads subscriptions list, i.e. user/UID/subscriptions/node, as you suggested.

    #5

    alakon - July 28, 2008 - 20:42

    I've attached two user interface mockups, one for the main page, the other for the page subscriptions list.

    They are to be considered a rough draft -- some of the wording is imprecise or just plain inarticulate, and I'm not entirely sure how feasible it would be to implement many of the changes.

    This is not a "wish list" -- Just consider this a piece to spark some discussion.

    AttachmentSize
    226767-mockup-page-subscriptions.png30.09 KB
    226767-mockup-main-page.png34.16 KB

    #6

    salvis - July 28, 2008 - 20:51

    Comments invited — thanks!

     
     

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