On Sun, Apr 3, 2011 at 10:06, James Cammarata <jimi@sngx.net> wrote:
On Sun, Apr 3, 2011 at 9:16 AM, James Cammarata <jimi@sngx.net> wrote:
>>> I thought about moving
>>> it to a three column format, with the pagination/filter stuff on the
>>> right, but I didn't like it much better. I do think some of the
>>> actions might be ok for the right, but the filter stuff really should
>>> be at the top.  I'm also considering moving the page controls to the
>>> bottom under the list.
>>
>> I don't think three column is right for this.  There does need to be
>> some separation between the actions and the pagination.  I don't have
>> strong feelings about whether filters should go with actions or
>> pagination.  I prefer the filters on the top, so I think if you move
>> pagination to the bottom, which seems a reasonable idea, filters should
>> stay with actions.
>
> Yeah, the more I look at it, the more I think the pagination stuff
> should be at the bottom.
>

The other thought I had was the "actions" column should be nixed and
moved up into the new "actions" combo box. I'm debating that though,
because the user would have to select one object and then select the
action from the drop-down box... not sure if I like that.  It would
allow us to display more info about each object in the table though.


James,

so.. we discussed some page re-designs a while ago in passing, and I agree,the filter and pagination belongs on top, with pagination also at the bottom... the only problem I'm seeing with that is that its extremely cluttered.
which is unfortunate.   since our previous conversation i've been meaning to play with this and so I did this morning.  I tried a few things:

1: Combined all actions under a single menu, with <optgroup> separations.  You can only really perform one action at a time, and all actions have a confirmation result of sorts, so it made sense to me.  The page specific optgroups would of course be dynamic, and on initial entry would only have the global actions.

2: Make batch and global actions separate drop downs, with the single action entry as a its own button.  I know the profiles page has 2 entries... and so you could do two buttons there, but part of me wonders if that functionality should be performed at the form level rather than as an option.

3: tried filters on top or bottom... i think i like the bottom better

4: made per item actions look like buttons (I think it looks better, but cross-browser would require more testing than I did)

5: removed link underlines, and replaced it with color change on hover, using the color of the fieldset legends.

6: put pagination on top and bottom (when you've got 100 entries displayed its nice to not have to scroll all the way back up or down to change pages)

7: moved the online web chat to a separate "menu", and added the cobbler page and user documentation links.  It didn't feel like action or configuration to me, and I know i've occasionally clicked on the web chat absent mindedly when what I really wanted was the documentation, or on the cobbler logo wanting to goto the cobber web page.

The screen shots can be seen here:  http://nytefyre.net/images/cobbler.htm

also... if we could get the logo to stop injecting ~80px of wasted space on the right that would be awesome.. i played with it for a few seconds and it didn't go away.  I think it would be kewl if it could be dropped into the bottom left of the page where there is almost always empty space, but the way the colums flow i'm not sure how doable that is.

-greg