Suggested change to the question bank UI

Suggested change to the question bank UI

by Tim Hunt -
Number of replies: 12
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This is another random idea for a UI change that has been bouncing around in my brain. I thought I would see what people think. Even if people think this is a good idea, I have no idea when anyone might get time to implement it.

At the moment, in the qusetion bank, the various actions you can perform are shown as a long list of icons:

Question bank

In Moodle UI terms, that is very old-school. It used to be like that everywhere, but now, most places have switched to using an Edit menu, e.g. on the course page:

Course page example

The disadvantages of this are:

  • It now takes two clicks to do some things that you could previously do in one click.

The advantages of this are:

  • There is space to have an explanatory word next to each icon.
  • The 'Edit' and all the menu choices are much bigger than a single icon, which makes it easier to use, particularly on a touch-screen.
  • This is consistent with the rest of the Moodle UI.
  • It is feasible to include more options in the menu than there is for separate icons.
Although I made that final point last, it is actually why I stared thinking about this.
  1. In Moodle 3.6 there is now an option to export a single question in Moodle XML format (MDL-63738). However, this option only appears when you preview the question. When I was coding it, I thought it would not fit in the question bank question list, and it was hard to know what icon to use.
  2. Some advanced question types (e.g. CodeRunner and STACK) have additional actions that you can perform on questions. We have long wanted a better way to make those available to question authors. (At the moment, we bodge it by: if you have permission to edit the question, we show some extra links when you preview the question.) A better option woudl be a hook so that the question type can add extra actions to the edit menu in the question bank.
Anyway, please let me know what you think. Thanks.
Average of ratings: Useful (7)
In reply to Tim Hunt

Re: Suggested change to the question bank UI

by Mary Cooch -
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Well I take your point about the extra clicks, but I think that is offset by the space saving advantage, the consistency and the possibility of having an explanatory word .
When can you start? smile
Average of ratings: Useful (2)
In reply to Tim Hunt

Re: Suggested change to the question bank UI

by Rick Jerz -
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I understand the move to the drop-down edit, and would support it especially if there are more features added. But I do wonder about removing the "created by" and "last modified" columns. These columns seem to serve an informational need for questions, whereas the drop-down edit, or icons, are "action" oriented. Occasionally when I am looking at questions in a question bank, I like to quickly scan which questions have been modified recently, so that "last modified" column is really beneficial. Or are you thinking of building the information in both of these columns into an "i" (information) icon or drop-down?
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In reply to Rick Jerz

Re: Re: Suggested change to the question bank UI

by Tim Hunt -
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I was assuming that the Created and Last modified columns would not change. This change is just focussing on the action icons.
Average of ratings: Useful (2)
In reply to Tim Hunt

Re: Re: Re: Suggested change to the question bank UI

by Rick Jerz -
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Okay, Tim. Then it seems like your proposal is the way to go in order to make the current general interface with Moodle consistent. Some folks will like it, and some will not. I am attaching a graphic showing how I most commonly see questions in my question bank. Yes, the icons are taking up some space occupied by the question title. It would be nice to see more of the question title.

You might notice the large around of white space between the "created by" and "last modified" columns. If in making the icon-to-edit change you could reduce the white space between these columns, I think it would help. (Yes, I could probably create some custom CSS to reduce this space.)

Thanks for bringing up this idea to improve the interface.

You also make me think about what other features might be added to the drop down. Hmmm, I don't know.
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In reply to Tim Hunt

Re: Suggested change to the question bank UI

by Joseph Rézeau -
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2 suggestions:
* could you add a "filter by question type" filter option?
* when editing a quiz, the 2 columns "Created by" and "Last modified by" are not displayed, why not?
Average of ratings: Useful (2)
In reply to Tim Hunt

Re: Suggested change to the question bank UI

by Ewout ter Haar -

1. while you're at it, you could do the same for the Category tab:

2. not a question bank issue, but one thing I'm always embarrassed by during training is the add questions to the quiz interface. The "add question" interface item so hidden away.


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In reply to Ewout ter Haar

Re: Re: Suggested change to the question bank UI

by Tim Hunt -
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Those are also good ideas, but they are separate ideas. One step at a time.
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In reply to Tim Hunt

Re: Suggested change to the question bank UI

by Daniel Thies -
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Time might be better spent revising to code to use a renderer. A theme should be able to change from icons to a menu by overriding a renderer of adding a template. The table element are mostly hard coded HTML.
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In reply to Daniel Thies

Re: Suggested change to the question bank UI

by Tim Hunt -
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I think you can assume that any rewrite would use renderers and templates.

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In reply to Tim Hunt

Re: Suggested change to the question bank UI

by Dominique Bauer -
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To click or not to click

The disadvantages of this are:

It now takes two clicks to do some things that you could previously do in one click.

In the Google Chrome menus, you do not click an item to get a sub-menu, you just hover over it. Clicking is for selecting an item without sub-menu.

Just for fun, in plain JS and jQuery: smile

black eye

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