Too much scrolling on issue page - less navigation, or more compact navigation

I don't think the issue queues need the Download & Extend heading and Download & Extend menu. The breadcrumb will take the user back to the module page, which still has the Download & Extend treatment, which is fine. We had to remove navigation on some of the Book nodes too.

drumm, is this something you can look at?

Tagging for design review

- Let's think about making the section title less prominent before making special cases for sections of the site.
- We haven't seriously looked at node headers at all.
- Project issues haven't had much special attention. Project and version could go on one line, and others could be combined. The word 'Description' isn't accomplishing anything either.

The header can't really get less whitespace without making the wordmark too cramped, https://infrastructure.drupal.org/drupal.org-style-guide/logo.html. The section tabs don't really have space to spare either.

The upper right isn't visually connected to the main content area. I think we should work with the section title through page title and make sure it looks connected to the rest of the site.

If this is just about issue pages, #936304: [META] Style issue comments has more discussion.

I agree with Moshe that this is a problem, and with Lisa's proposed solution in #2. We really don't need the down+ext nav on issue pages -- we need to get back to the project that issue is from, or to other issues, but not to the project browsing pages. If we really want to, we can use the top right nav (which I agree with Moshe #6 that it should be highlighted -- although that should probably be a separate issue about doing that site-wide).

+1 on this issue. One small but obvious things that can help, change the css below to something like 0.5em (I can roll a patch to do this if it seems appropriate).

#content .node, #aggregator .feed-item {
  margin-bottom:2.769em;

Btw- is there a reason why the number 2.769 was chosen? Seems like a nice random #. I also think it would be wise to separate node content from aggregated feed items- is there any reason to keep them together?

I think a return to breadcrumbs here is the sensible way to go- none of the clutter at the top of the page is going to be useful to anyone actually in an issue. Can we please remove "Download and Extend" as well as the menu below it?

2.769 * the font size 13 = 36px. Each line of text takes up 18px. It is good to keep lines of text lining up to that horizontal grid. See http://webtypography.net/Rhythm_and_Proportion/Vertical_Motion/2.2.2/

http://beta.drupal.org/news and http://beta.drupal.org/planet are nodes and aggregator items. They should look generally the same. And they need to be well-separated from each other. I think it should stay the same for node & aggregator pages, but can be reduced a bit on node pages.

From Moshe's screenshot in #6, the real difference is not too much. Doing things like:
- Reduce whitespace between node body & comments header
- Remove the word 'Description'
- Make the issue settings table make better use of horizontal space, and less vertical space

These will add up a bit.

I do think issue pages deserve attention, but not removing chunks of consistent, site-wide navigation.

If we're keeping this site-wide navigation, I'd strongly encourage us to consider using up less vertical space with it.

I agree that the other items could be tightened up, but there's only so much we can do to compensate for a significant influx of pixels that almost no one is going to want to use when they're viewing an issue.

If we're keeping the navigation, perhaps also removing the word 'Comments' would help (it doesn't exist on the old d.o.)

I completely agree that the "Download & Extend" plus tab is both distracting and using incredibly valuable real estate, and would prefer to eliminate it. "Download & Extend" seems distracting and it's not even remotely what I think the issue queue really feels like it is part of.

Second, the styling on the issue state isn't working for my eyes. I find it difficult to read, plus, it stands out far more than the text due to the heavy background color on the striping, so my eyes jump to it, but it's not the most important information. When compared to current drupal.org, it is really bothering me. Lightening the striping colors might help this a lot. Floating that to the right might help it a lot, I'm not sure.

Also consider - this is one of few places on the site with the content spanning the full page width. That can be quite long to read. In general, text is 1/3 or 2/3 of the page width. There will of course be pushback for not using all available space, but if the 1/3 of space is used well for meta information, attachments, etc, then I think we can get by with "only" 2/3 of the page used for comment text.

@merlinofchaos #13: the table zebra stripes used to be so subtle they were basically invisible. See #936420: Table zebra striping is only visible for the active column. Maybe we should split the difference, but they still look very subtle on my screens (colors on the web suck). Anyway, #936420 is the place to discuss that, not here.

@drumm #14: This issue is talking about vertical space. You started talking about horizontal space but then morphed into talking about vertical space, too. That's not making sense to me. Whether the comments are full page width is irrelevant to how much vertical space is wasted on navigation that no one wants when viewing this page.

I think it makes sense to remove the section title and section nav, for the following reasons :

1) This is so deep into the structure, that the section nav gives very little direction "where" you are". The project title does so more.
2) You are unable to quickly see which project you are in.
3) Its unlikely to navigate to module listing, theme listing or any other of those listed in section nav from a reading / working on issue queue perspective.

Its not necessarily a big problem that vertical space is hindered by these items, but not being able to clearly see "where" you are is. In this case the "where" is the project, not necessarily that you are in download & extend > modules/themes its likely people in the issue queue at least have some understanding of this already. Context is king :)

I made a post on a related issue that was postponed. The sub-section navigation is out of order. Agreed there is much overhead.

Original at : http://drupal.org/node/869936#comment-3297138

Yeah, IMO we need to do something here...

So... a few of us were chatting about this in the wrong issue but were helpfully pointed this way. I can copy comments over from there or link, but the most pertinent thing in my opinion was the mock-up in http://drupal.org/node/869936#comment-3593910. It essentially collapses the section title and secondary tabs and moves the local action link beneath the tab line so it's in the context of the actual page you're visiting. It then increases the font size of the page title. It immediately struck me as better, but I don't have a design eye at all... it just seemed easier to use.

Edit: image link - http://drupal.org/files/issues/Blue-Cheese-header-attempt.png

Actually, #869936: Subnavigation improvements is both an older issue, and trying to approach the problem site-wide. I think it's true we want a unified solution to this problem, not just a special-case for issue pages. So, I'm calling this issue duplicate. Let's move over to addressing this problem in #869936.

Other special-case optimizations for issues pages (like removing the useless "Description" header) are being addressed at #936304: [META] Style issue comments already.

Thanks everyone!

Subscribing. Listening.

Ops, sorry for cross posting.

That's not a duplicate at all, not of this issue.
that issue is

1- the comment borders/bounding box
2- shading around the "status" messages
3- float the "Login or Register" link to the right
4- bold the user name
5- change the "posted by" and the date to a light grey
6- some shading to the actual attachments

@chx: all that is being discussed in #936304: [META] Style issue comments

@chx: and the question of making the GIANT IN YOUR FACE SITE NAVIGATION more tame when you're looking at issues is in fact being discussed (actively) at #869936: Subnavigation improvements