Usability Suggestion – Global Editing

Usability Suggestion – Global Editing

by Tara Mann -
Number of replies: 10

Hi Fellow Moodlers,

I've been working on a few basic overall usability suggestions after conducting a basic evaluation and I would love to know what others think of these. I've created a visual mockup illustrating the before and after. My first example hopes to improve the cognitive load a user may experience when turning the global editing settings on. At the moment so many tools and options appear that the interface actually slightly readjusts. This may seem small, but the user must re-evaluate what they are seeing. I'm proposing a "tools when you need them" approach utilising the commonly used little cog icon to access settings. Anyway, see what you think, and feel free to read more about the reasons behind this suggestion on this blog post.

Moodle Usability – Global Editing

Average of ratings: Useful (2)
In reply to Tara Mann

Re: Usability Suggestion – Global Editing

by Marcus Green -
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Nice! Read the blog post everyone, some nice coverage of concepts.

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In reply to Marcus Green

Re: Usability Suggestion – Global Editing

by Mary Cooch -
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I'm sure one of the themes has something along these lines - well - only showing editing icons when you need them - unfortunately I can't remember what it's called in order to be able to do a search mixed

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In reply to Mary Cooch

Re: Usability Suggestion – Global Editing

by Tara Mann -

Thanks for the quick responses! smile Are there different core themes available to view somewhere? I've based this off the standard default test site interactions (which I think are similar to the new MoodleCloud). The theme at my university is quite different but still shares these editing interactions. Thanks!

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In reply to Tara Mann

Re: Usability Suggestion – Global Editing

by Marcus Green -
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There are lots of themes in the plugins database you can download and install. 

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In reply to Marcus Green

Re: Usability Suggestion – Global Editing

by Mary Cooch -
Picture of Documentation writers Picture of Moodle HQ Picture of Particularly helpful Moodlers Picture of Testers Picture of Translators

Link to Contributed themes here 

There are only two core themes - Clean and More. And what I was going on about vaguely in my previous post was a feature called "autohide" which used CSS to hide some of the edit icons until needed - but apparently it's no longer used or rated.

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In reply to Mary Cooch

Re: Usability Suggestion – Global Editing

by Sue Holtz -

So these icons are no longer available? Editing icons display  They made my work so much easier, especially the move right and show/hide icons.

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In reply to Sue Holtz

Re: Usability Suggestion – Global Editing

by Mary Cooch -
Picture of Documentation writers Picture of Moodle HQ Picture of Particularly helpful Moodlers Picture of Testers Picture of Translators

I'm not quite sure what you mean Sue - the icons are still available but since 2.6 they live under the "Edit" link next to an activity or resource, to free up space, particularly for smaller screens.

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In reply to Mary Cooch

Re: Usability Suggestion – Global Editing

by Sue Holtz -

I was hoping to be able to still display them without having to click on the Edit link. I like to indent activities and supporting materials and having to click the Edit button adds time. It seems to me there was an option to do this when we upgraded to 2.6. We are now upgrading to 2.8, and I would like to do the same thing.

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In reply to Tara Mann

Re: Usability Suggestion – Global Editing

by Derek Chirnside -

Tara, Nice.

Completely OT.  I'd be interested in your comments on my post here: https://moodle.org/mod/forum/discuss.php?d=316278

I'm looking at the basics of navigation between and within the sections.

-Derek

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In reply to Derek Chirnside

Re: Usability Suggestion – Global Editing

by Tara Mann -

Thanks Derek. I've had a quick look and it looks like you've created some interesting solutions to the navigation. I'll definitely get back to this and give you some of my thoughts. There is definitely something that doesn't feel quite right within course navigation. But I haven't quite been able to put my finger on it or think of an alternative solution. 

Thanks,

Tara

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