Flow/Design/Iteration 1

Design review notes on this iteration
Flow Design review — 2013.09.04

Archive

We need a way to access old talk page, but should deemphasis its use, some suggestions
 * have access from text link at bottom of flow board (end of scroll) banner at top of page
 * header of the flow page
 * temporary full site width banner on talk & board (like VE beta switch)

Threading

have to come up with something that will work on mobile (small screen) and desktop keep exploring options:
 * subtle indenting with/out lines
 * max limit on indenting
 * does this make sense? how do we make limit non-arbitrary
 * We can try to discretize into meaningful levels. For example 3 levels: topic, point, replies. The key is to find the point at which the structure of the conversation does not suffer if you show it flat. In addition, we can provide an option to promote some reply as a new topic. I made a quick example at: http://etherpad.wikimedia.org/p/gAbC9cvA3P (just based on 1 conversation, so not generalisable)
 * no indenting
 * other options…

Topics

 * permalink
 * rename
 * hide
 * topic history
 * close
 * summarize
 * split topic (investigate need in MVP)
 * merge topic (investigate need in MVP)

Other users' post

 * permalink
 * hide
 * thank
 * history
 * reply
 * promote to new Topic (Not part of MVP)

My posts

 * edit
 * permalink
 * hide
 * history
 * reply (investigate)

Admin Topic

 * permalink
 * hide
 * delete
 * suppress
 * edit (admin/priv)

Admin Post

 * permalink
 * hide
 * delete
 * suppress
 * thank
 * edit (admin/priv) (*pending research)
 * promote to new Topic (Not part of MVP)

Require users to mark why they flag (hide) a post
 * abusive
 * off-topic (never should we do this)
 * user error (dupe, no longer relevant, etc)


 * Attempt to have all action be contextual, but be aware action list could become longer (esp. for Admins)
 * Keep positive and negative actions somewhat seperate esp. for one click actions
 * Alternatively use a "verb" based interface where user describes whats going on, and system applies action, e.g. creating new thread, hiding, thanking, etc

Layout

 * More closely align author with post content (above rather than below)
 * differentiate my posts, posts i'm mentioned in, unread, hidden, deleted
 * can't rely on hover as only means of telling if topic is expanded or not (no hover on touch)
 * Think about using tabs for saved or default searches, e.g. unread, mentions me, watched, etc…


 * Consider fixed header for topic and actions for context
 * Start mobile design now, in tandem with desktop to find issues early

Expanding/Collapsing

 * Do we need to support expanding and collapsing posts (Brandon does not think so.)
 * Expanding vs collapsed vs no replies for a topic should be immediately obvious
 * Do we need explicit carat for expanding and collapsing or can we rely on topic title
 * Can we get away with intelligent rules for auto-expanding and collapsing?
 * Old (age?) threads with no unread messages are collapsed - here's the thing: old threads will naturally sink to the "bottom" of the stack.  If you've never read the page before, and you start scrolling down, you're going to hit "closed" posts and have to open them manually, and that sucks
 * Most recent/active threads always expanded by default - same problem as above
 * Collapsed individual top level replies to topics with comments by default

Navigation aids
Is worth exploring some navigation aids to help dealing with the complexity of conversations. Some examples from Discourse (http://try.discourse.org/t/most-important-sci-fi-movie-of-the-2000-s/27) anaysed:
 * Progress + jump option
 * Summary of what there is below (direct access to last post and participants from the top)
 * Actionable quotations.