I think that the strings for the tabs could be improved:

    * Messages
          o All messages
          o Inbox
          o Sent Messages
    * Write new Message
    * Tag

The first thing is capitalization: All (m)essages vs. Sent (M)essages, etc, should be more consistent.

Secondly, I think we could probably loose all the extra messages. You know you are already at messages, so It might make sense to shorten things a bit...

    * Messages
          o All
          o Inbox
          o Sent
    * Compose
    * Tag

Looking around at what others use for creating a new message:

Gmail: "Compose Mail"
Hotmail: "New"
Facebook: "Compose New Message"

Comments

aharown07’s picture

aharown07 commented

Like these ideas. I'd prefer "write" to "compose" but not a biggy.

frankcarey’s picture

frankcarey commented

for me the alternative to "write new message" is the trickiest, and I think it's an important one. New Users come to the site and want to create a new message, what text is the best balance of short and descriptive?

A couple more ideas for folk to weigh in on.

"Create"
or
"Create New"

Thoughts?

frankcarey’s picture

frankcarey commented
Title: UI Imporvements: Tab Strings more consistent and shorter » UI Improvements: Tab Strings more consistent and shorter

spelling :)

Plazmus’s picture

Plazmus commented

This one is also about tab improvements #469350: UI Improvements: Move secondary tabs to primary tabs

String consistency definitely should be sorted as now it looks quite messy.

I like idea shortening things, so for creating a new message in Thunderbird I have simple "Write", but probably I would prefer slightly more descriptive version "Write message" I also like "Create New".

I personally don't like the idea of secondary tabs for privatemsg, possibility to switch between two rows and one row of tabs still having "Inbox" available would be great, also vertical tabs as alternative might be a good addition.

frankcarey’s picture

frankcarey commented

Isn't vertical tabs just for forms? (assuming you mean the vertical tabs module)

Plazmus’s picture

Plazmus commented

@frankcarey I just spotted that you started both of this thread.

I didn't mean 'vertical tabs' module, but just the way all that links may be displayed (as an option).

naheemsays’s picture

naheemsays commented

Just a note that the tags tab would disapear as part of #442102: Replace tag checkboxes with autocomplete textfield

frankcarey’s picture

frankcarey commented

If #469350: UI Improvements: Move secondary tabs to primary tabs goes through, the new structure would look like this, how about these string changes?:

* All messages -> All
* Inbox -> (same)
* Sent Messages -> Sent
* Write new Message -> Create New
* Tags -> (might be going away anyway)

berdir’s picture

berdir
Primary language German
Location Switzerland
commented
Status: Active » Closed (duplicate)

Is now included in #469350: UI Improvements: Move secondary tabs to primary tabs, marking this as duplicate.

naheemsays’s picture

naheemsays commented

Mentioned in the other issue, but I will repeat here anyway, but I disagree with the shortenings - especially the "All messages" -> "All" and "Write new Message" -> "Create New".

THey are too lacking in context and if site builders want them, they should use one of the other methods to change the names IMO instead of privatemsg providing these by default.

frankcarey’s picture

frankcarey commented
Status: Closed (duplicate) » Active

@nbz I understand your concern, but it seems to me that there is enough context built in that the tab names can remain short and not confuse a user. I think having [Inbox][Sent][All][Create New] all next to each other as tabs with "Message" in the page title is something that users are accustomed to seeing when dealing with messages. I tried to look around at facebook, gmail, hotmail, and others and these seem to be industry standard at this point. Do you really think users would have no clue what "All" or "create new" is with the other tabs? Each tab page title (not tab title) could be more verbose, say "Sent Messages", "All Messges", "Create New Message"? thoughts?

@Berdir moving back to active. If we don't have consensus, maybe we should deal with them separately?

naheemsays’s picture

naheemsays commented

Gmail uses "Compose Mail", Sent Mail and All Mail. Facebook as "Inbox", "Sent Messages" and a "compose Message". Hotmail has the shorter names of "Inbox", "Sent" and "new" so it seems that we are well in line with what others do (I dislike hotmail, so not doing what it does is in my eyes a good thing...).

I dislike "Create New" because to me it sounds like a sentence has been cut off mid way through. It jarrs. (just "new" on its own, or "new message" is IMO better)

It is not only about context, but good defaults too and I personally feel that the longer titles are better. Ofcourse others can and do disagree

litwol’s picture

litwol commented

I think short strings like 'All' to mean 'All messages' are unacceptable. 'All' holds little in it self, but worse is that this string is too short to be useful in locale or string override module string translations...

Here we must strike a balance between short string and unique string for translations.

Out of the box not every string in this module will satisfy every user, however we must be sure that every string in this module is sufficiently unique to allow site admin to trasnlate it without conflicting other strings on the site.

frankcarey’s picture

frankcarey commented

@litwol: the unique string translation aspect is something i hadn't considered, and seems to me to make my previous points moot. We have gotten rid of the "messages" tab in the related issue, so we have a little less "messages" overload. And I can just use menu_alter to make them shorter if i like. (translation seems to me to have too much overhead). I still think That there should be better consistency, namely capitalization ..."The first thing is capitalization: All (m)essages vs. Sent (M)essages, etc, should be more consistent." I trust that idea is still agreeable? Should it be:

a) first letter of string is capitalized only

OR

b) first letter of each word is capitalized

frankcarey’s picture

frankcarey commented

i think i like a) better btw

berdir’s picture

berdir
Primary language German
Location Switzerland
commented

That's how I did it in the other issue ;)

frankcarey’s picture

frankcarey commented
Status: Active » Closed (works as designed)

cool! i'll mark this by design based on the consensus to leave the length of the stings the same.