Hei.
I'm fairly new to drupal, but have setup a couple of sites now. I really like it, but I miss something very important (in my customers eyes): A more "sexy" administrator interface with a custom look and feel. I have tried the control panel module, but this is really just a simple table with some images that link to the different administrator tasks. It's a start, but I need to:
- Customize the appearance of the "add content" forms. Changing style on the form elements etc, kan be done with CSS, but what if I want to change the order of the elements or simply create a totally different layout on the entire page containing the form? I cannot see how I can do this with themes and my current knowledge of drupal :)
- Maybe even display the entire administrator interface in a completely separate layout, making sure I can use the entire window width for editing etc. without worrying about users using a "small-width" theme which makes the FCK-editor narrow, making adding articles and other content cumbersome...
My experience with drupal so far is that once you get the hang of it, it's fast, scalable and easy to use, but every time I show it off to people I get the same response: "What's up with that evil text-based administrator menu? It looks like something made by computer engineers made for computer engineers! I want it to be more sexy to be able to enjoy using it in my day to day work!". I guess it's quite true. Remember that people are used to administrator interfaces like the ones found in mambo and seagull.
It doesn't matter if making the admin menu / interface sexy, actually makes it "slower" and "more time consuming to use". That fact that it's sexy seems to be the no 1. priority among my customers :/
Any thoughts about this? Why can't it be sexy? Where do I start?
Comments
civicspace theme
The Civicspace theme has a separate lay-out for the admin pages. Maybe you can take a look at how they did it, and start from there?
Controlpanel module
Hi,
May be contropanel module will add some more sexy administration.
Sunny
www.gleez.com
On the other hand...
kulvik: I'm fairly new to drupal, but have setup a couple of sites now. I really like it, but I miss something very important (in my customers eyes): A more "sexy" administrator interface with a custom look and feel.
I'm migrating from Mambo to Drupal, and one of the things I LIKE is the integrated admin/user arrangement.
kulvik: My experience with drupal so far is that once you get the hang of it, it's fast, scalable and easy to use, but every time I show it off to people I get the same response: "What's up with that evil text-based administrator menu? It looks like something made by computer engineers made for computer engineers! I want it to be more sexy to be able to enjoy using it in my day to day work!". I guess it's quite true. Remember that people are used to administrator interfaces like the ones found in mambo and seagull.
For my money, "sexy" gets boring REAL fast. One of the great turn-offs for me is all the visual garbage people feel compelled to put into their user interfaces.
Simple and clean wear better. Less "stuff" on each page, and more pages divided into logical functions.
I thought about doing a separate theme for admin, but was finally able to control all the elements via CSS to fit on an 800x600 screen.
Another think I like about Drupal is that the core package is under TWO MEGABYTES, not 5 or 10 or 15! Featuritis and bloat is one thing I wanted to get away from. I went through some Mambo code tonight, and some Drupal code--and I can tell you without a moments hesitation which is coded FAR more cleanly and efficiently--and I've only been using PHP for a few months!
Having said that, I understand the 'more is better' urge. I hope the designers of the core package will resist it, however, and leave the fancy stuff to the after-marketeers.
And THANKS for keeping the Javascript to a bare minimum, if at all.
Curtis
the choice
While I personally agree with you, I think it is great having these extra options in contrib for anybody who would like them - this way we have a choice.
They should not be compulsory in core - all those extra graphics just slow down things.
Best regards,
Lennart
Best regards,
Lennart
Well...
Thanks for the reply Curtis.
I must say: Personally I agree with you. I like alle the code, functionality and interfaces as clean, fast, scalable and easy to understand as possible. (In true open source spirit). The problem however, is that it doesn't matter what you and I think about this. What really matter is the opinions of the people that don't care about technical stuff at all. The simple users and "node publishers" should have the final word on this.
I totally agree with other posts here that we need both.. A good alternative for those who want a graphics-intensive administration interface is needed.
Drupal is worthless if it's only used by software developers for creating personal homepages, while the interesting corporate users stick with seagull and mambo.
It's crap, I know, but some times it actually comes down to the looks of things.
Imagine this: You're sitting in a Mac environment, where everything looks stunning and use programs with fluid, eye-catching interfaces. Then you launch safari to administer your drupal site. It's like suddenly switching to a Commodore 64 with a double Tape Deck :/
- Thomas -
"If I do this, he might kick me back. That's not what I want. So I break his arm" - Bas Rutten
CivicSpace admin + ControlPanel
I use the sections module to be able to theme admin pages differently. Perhaps that may address some of your formatting questions.
Here is an example of using the sections module, the CivicSpace admin theme and the ControlPanel module
Also, if you're using CVS HEAD (soon to be 4.7) here's an example of using the BlockBar module with the Control Panel module. This give you a more graphical navigation than the out-of-the box menus.
Thanks
Thanks for the input. I'll check it out.
- Thomas -
"If I do this, he might kick me back. That's not what I want. So I break his arm" - Bas Rutten