Get an administration theme into core

Hi.
Ok, then I have to show you my try. Its not a theme yet but a small suggestion how it could look like.
I played a little with jQuery (and am really happy to hear jQuery is used in upcoming version of drupal).

I have did some small cleanup, so that the administer index page looks as intended (some CSS classes collided), plus added previously missing images. Now it looks even cooler :) See the screenshots in my sandbox linked above.

Nice, but IMO we should have something closer to bluemarine, atleast something blue....

I like the original one in the sandbox. I like the fact that the header is very minimal in size... the interface around doing the administration should be very minimal.

Maybe Garland could be stripped down... but still have the feel of the main site.

stBorchert: do you have that theme copy lingering around anywhere?

stBorchert: do you have that theme copy lingering around anywhere?

Uh, I changed the subdomain sometime (don't ask why, can't remember :-)): http://devel.borchert.cc/drupal/style/index.html

It's pretty simple and basic (and an old version of jquery, and ...).
I've attached the source so you could play with it.

Btw: only "users", "themes" and "modules" are clickable.

stBorchert: I am trying to get the early efforts of admin themes being available for any future tinkering :) Thanks!

Marking as 7.x.

An admin theme should be a standard part of Drupal IMO. Work on an admin theme should take place in contrib and ported to D7 when ready IMO. See http://www.nerdliness.com/article/2007/12/02/drupal-admin-theme for one of the latest efforts in this area. Here is my current "hit list" of what a "proper" administration theme should be...

- easy on the eyes
- enhance usability
- have a flexible width
- be hard to break
- support the color module for different color schemes.

subscribing..

Hi all,
I have started on drupal admin theme, then found this thread. I did a blog post with what I have on my mind > http://sotak.co.uk/drupal-admin-theme-vol-1
I am also doing some research on user interfaces, and best practices in different user environment.

Still it's quite far from where I want to get.

Civicspace theme? civicspacelabs.org the main theme? IMO it is a pretty poorly designed site I am sure the community could come up with a more robust contribution

A more recent thread regarding Admin Themes is here:
http://drupal.org/node/211075

how a zen-like theme for admin... with some added colors.

This is an important issue for user experience. Subscribing (for now).

Similar issues :
#293540: New theme to include for core
#197224: Create a Drupal 7 theme

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Comparing all suggestions with the administration interface of other CMS, http://sotak.co.uk/drupal-admin-theme-vol-1, resp. Rootcandy theme, is probably going in the direction that most users would expect. However, a default administration theme for Drupal should definitely not try to replicate a menu like Drupal Administration Menu, but rather integrate seamlessly with it (referring to the top bar in that theme).

Aside from that, I would like to see a promoted poll on g.d.o (or elsewhere) to get real data about the question whether people are actually using a separate administration theme at all. IMHO, it is perfectly possible that users are rather sticking to Drupal Administration Menu, Teleport, Super Nav, or Double Click than having to deal with a separate administration theme. Why "deal"? Keyword: Missing "sections" in Drupal. But this is not the proper issue to expand on this topic.

In answer to the posters who refer to other 'new theme' threads, may I please clarify that this particular thread is a discussion specifically about the administrative theme for Drupal 7. It is not intended to reference 'another theme for D7'.

@sun: I'd vote for Rootcandy as a far and away superior administration theme for D7, but I also agree with you that admin_menu is an irreplaceable tool and should not simply be folded into an administrative theme. The ability to install admin_menu on a client site, or to patch it for instant new functionality is great and that ability should not be lost.

http://vision-media.ca/files/images/2/blue.jpg

What I personally hate extremely about the default administration interface is that it takes you often more than two clicks to get somewhere, mainly because the menu isn't expanded by default. IMO a good admin interface would allow admins to easily go to the page they want to go to, possibly using an already expanded (drop down) menu. Some other good additions would be blocks informing the administrator about 404 pages that get visited often, spam reports, etc.

What I think is important as well is that a default admin theme should not look very different from the normal default theme so it doesn't scare users that are unfamiliar with the whole admin theme business.

I think that RootCandy is good admin theme for Drupal.

There are some themes outdated in core, why not an admin modern theme like RootCandy? ...but I don't known if an admin theme should be enabled by default.

My own thoughts about admin themes :

#1 - For skilled drupal admin or developper there's nothing better than something like admin menu.
#2 - For editor or less skilled webmaster an admin theme like root candy is reassuring
#3 - Admin theme is usefull when training people that will have different front office theme --> even if the front office theme is different the back-office is the same.
#4 - Admin theme layout can be optimized for admin content which obviously not the cas for an all purpose theme
#5 - See wordpress admin for 2.7 to have a benchmark of what can be done, dashboard, menus : http://wordpress.org/development/2008/10/the-visual-design-of-27/
#5bis : When i see all the buzz around the new admin interface of WP, I am thinking that it is something very important for the average user and that the design is a kind of package for all the features of the application --> beautiful package = perceived as a good product
#6 - Some admin pages do not show the admin theme : for example account configuration shows the front office theme, there should be a patch to be able to specify the paths that use admin them (like for node/edit)
#7 - Admin theme could have a flexible dashboard (block regions) that allows to create customized dashboards (block views or panels, ...)
#8 - Having an admin theme in core would enable to leverage the community to create an outstanding admin theme (speaking of usability, design...) and the drupal application will benefit from this outstanding theme

So yes I think that we should put an admin theme in core, and root candy may be a good start.

Good points and summary.

Although incorrect, technically. An admin theme in Drupal is nothing more than a regular theme, tied to certain paths only. Without the "Administration theme" site configuration setting, you could achieve the same with http://drupal.org/project/sections module, additionally allowing you to specify more paths or even use PHP to match the pages where the "admin theme" should appear.

Anyway, I think your points are valid. However, we neither have such "dashboard" blocks in core, nor are themes able to provide blocks on their own. So we cannot easily achieve something like Wordpress' admin theme currently. One possible option for allowing this would be: Allow modules to ship with themes in their own module folder. I.e.: A module "admin_theme" could contain a module providing the necessary blocks, menus, etc., but also contain a theme "admin_theme", which is tied to certain system paths. An "Advanced admin theme" module would be able to additionally require Panels module and provide a Panels layout along with pre-configured panes.

looking to the other (default) theme development thread... I think RootCandy is our default admin sub-theme for the core theme.

Killer feature for drupal = a brandable admin area

A new thought about admin theme :
* Current strenght : flexibility --> any theme can be an admin theme, including custom personnal themes
* Current weakness : no core theme designed exclusively for being an admin theme with admin usability in mind

Idea :
* implement a flexible admin theme framework, designed from the beginning as an admin theme.
* Flexibility enable every themer to easily brand the back-office to its own colors, logo, identity.
* One subtheme included designed by theming and usability experts and activated by default.

Consequence : a killer feature for Drupal, an outstanding out-of the box admin back-office very easy to brand, extend and to adapt to custom needs.

Sun #26
Yes you are right.

My point was to say that if we put an admin theme into core we should have, in core, the feature to chose wich urls shows in admin theme and which urls shows in front theme. Otherwise the admin theme would not be usable in real life...

For the dashboard, it may be better placed in a contrib module.

Ineation #29
Had a similar thought about admin theme settings
http://groups.drupal.org/node/15672 - 2nd comment

Well, this brings me back to the points in #25: The whole point is that an admin theme is rather used on small/private sites, resp. by novice Drupal users, and perhaps also on a few sites, where the regions of the default design/layout are too small or inflexible for displaying admin pages. This is the audience for admin themes, and IMHO we should work towards meeting their expectations, instead of just dropping another theme into the themes folder. In other words:

- Moving Sections module, resp. its functionality, into core too geeky; requires knowledge about Drupal's path system and does nothing on its own.
- An admin theme like Rootcandy is nice, but not as nice as Wordpress' admin theme, which provides administrative features/blocks by default.
- Rootcandy itself contains some really dirty hacks to achieve its output, especially menus; that code has little chances to be moved into into core currently.

Ok,

* I agree root Candy is nice but not "ethic" enough and may be not flexible enough to get into core --> see my proposal on #28 (even if it may too much of a work for D7)
* Section module too geeky --> then put check boxes in the setting forms : node edit page / user account edit page / etc...
* Default blocks / dashboard : could be done by a module (contrib or not)

This is more than just a theme thinking, having a good admin theme means more than changing the output, it may change the way we work, therefore it involve also having an admin-theme module to manage specific settings, blocks and menus.

http://vision-media.ca/resources/drupal/drupal-6-evolution-administratio...

I am not finished yet, but it will be pretty slick :) still refining though.

RootCandy has dirty hacks, i agree, however, it shows perfectly what to expect from an admin theme.
The most important however, is that once we have "The One True Core Theme", that the default admin theme is just a subtheme of "The One True Core Theme".
#293540: New theme to include for core
http://drupal.org/node/293540#comment-1076165
http://groups.drupal.org/theme-development
http://groups.drupal.org/node/16200

also we need a way to specify where exactly to use the sdmin theme...

BTW: do we have the ability to require certain modules within themes?

Personally, I have been using Aquasoft as an Admin theme for a long time (mainly because of its small fonts and no waste of space). But as it is not yet ported to D6 (and maybe never will?) I switched to Pixture, which is very good for admin purposes.

An Admin Theme has a clear set of features, which are very much different from a front end theme:

- small fonts, no waste of space and thus small margins and paddings
- clear structure. The "boxing" of pixture which is not every designers Taste for Frontend is very helpful in the admin section
- weighed typografy that emphasizes Structure (headings, Links, descriptions) in a very balanced manner
- soft Iconisation (I mean some Icons, not too many.)

I am not opting tu use Pixture (which I also proposed as default frontend theme, I should think about something new :P) but it gets so many things right that it can be used as a sample what an Admin theme needs.

And one thing as my personal wish: The fact that Admin_menu is one of the most used Drupal Modules and a clear No.1 on drupalmodules.com http://drupalmodules.com/top-downloads shows the clear need for it. Everyone who ever tried it sticks to it.

To integrate it into an admin Theme is perfectly logical to me. But this would mean two things:
- What with the duplicate left bar menu and Admin overview page? Duplication is no good usability. Could be a fallback option for no Javascript though
- the styles would have to be changed. The black with very small fonts could be changed into something more friendly and readable. So the default admin menu could not be used. But as long as it is only styling, all upgrades of admin_menu could go into the theme, too.

Rootcandy may need some work under the surface, but I think functionally it is far ahead of the pack. I agree that adding some default block configuration, and adminmenu would be really beneficial also.

In my experience over the last couple of years most of what has driven most people away from really using drupal has been the poor admin interface. The drupal admin area scares people and we as a community need to debunk that.

Seven is now in D7.

cya later, issue

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