Small change to main entry point text ("...start typing a filter name")
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	Trizek-WMF
	Oct 12 2017, 1:03 PM

Description

On the feedback page, I had several people asking to have a better way to access the namespace filter menu. I'm not the only one to have that feeling.

I suggest users to use the search bar to type a filter name, which is apparently a feature not visible enough. T178539 adds more prominence to the Namespaces and Tags menus. But in addition, to give more prominence to the searching, let's tweak the default message in the search bar:

[now]
Filter recent changes (browse or start typing)

[please change to]
Filter changes (use menu or search for filter name)

Details

	Subject	Repo	Branch	Lines +/-
	RCFilters: Change main entry point text	mediawiki/core	master	+1 -1

Customize query in gerrit

Related Objects

Mentioned Here: T178539: Spell out Tags and Namespaces menus on top-level UI in order to increase discoverability

Event Timeline

Trizek-WMF created this task.Oct 12 2017, 1:03 PM

Restricted Application added a project: Collaboration-Team-Triage. · View Herald TranscriptOct 12 2017, 1:03 PM

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• jmatazzoni added a subscriber: Pginer-WMF.Oct 14 2017, 12:04 AM

Many users seem to have missed the small icons for Advanced Menus at right and are discovering the menus only through the main filter menu. If that's the problem, then changing the instruction text won't help. Data recently pulled by Roan (scroll down to see his monotype data pulls) show that the Namespace filters are very, very commonly used.

Given that, making these filters more discoverable might not be a bad thing to do. Given the fact that we are, sadly, NOT going to add any more Advanced Filter menus in the foreseeable future, the obvious solution is just to spell out the names of the menus over where they are now icons. Making these more explicitly named and bigger can't help but increase discoverability at the top level.

I recommend we make this change and change the name of this task to "Make Namespace and Tags menus more discoverable." @Pginer-WMF, what do you think?

Making the menu-search functions more discoverable is a separate issue. I personally doubt that any wording change will influence that.

• jmatazzoni renamed this task from Make MediaWiki:Rcfilters-search-placeholder more clear about the possible actions to Make Namespace and Tags menus more discoverable.Oct 14 2017, 12:10 AM

• jmatazzoni edited projects, added Collaboration-Team-Triage (Collab-Team-Next-Quarter); removed Collaboration-Team-Triage.Oct 18 2017, 9:51 PM

• jmatazzoni moved this task from Untriaged to Product/Design Work on the Collaboration-Team-Triage (Collab-Team-Next-Quarter) board.

• jmatazzoni renamed this task from Make Namespace and Tags menus more discoverable to Small change to main entry point text ("...start typing a filter name").Oct 18 2017, 9:54 PM

• jmatazzoni updated the task description. (Show Details)

• jmatazzoni moved this task from Product/Design Work to Snack Box on the Collaboration-Team-Triage (Collab-Team-Next-Quarter) board.

As Joe said, searching is not going to help much with namespaces. Regarding the change in the placeholder text, as I illustrated in T178539, it is already quite long in some languages. So while I'm happy to adjust the text to make it more clear, I'd prefer not to make it longer.

! In T178069#3699055, @Pginer-WMF wrote:

...Regarding the change in the placeholder text, as I illustrated in T178539, it is already quite long in some languages. So while I'm happy to adjust the text to make it more clear, I'd prefer not to make it longer.

How about this, which is clearer and maybe one letter shorter (in English):

[now]

Filter recent changes (browse or start typing)

[proposed]
Filter changes (use menu or search by name)

In T178069#3700929, @jmatazzoni wrote:

[proposed]
Filter changes (use menu or search by name)

Works for me.

• jmatazzoni updated the task description. (Show Details)Oct 23 2017, 11:13 AM

• Petar.petkovic claimed this task.Nov 1 2017, 9:02 AM

Change 387774 had a related patch set uploaded (by Petar.petkovic; owner: Petar.petkovic):
[mediawiki/core@master] RCFilters: Change main entry point text

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/387774

gerritbot added a project: Patch-For-Review.Nov 1 2017, 9:03 AM

• Petar.petkovic moved this task from Snack Box to Needs Review on the Collaboration-Team-Triage (Collab-Team-Next-Quarter) board.Nov 1 2017, 9:03 AM

SBisson moved this task from Needs Review to QA Review on the Collaboration-Team-Triage (Collab-Team-Next-Quarter) board.Nov 1 2017, 10:43 AM

Change 387774 merged by jenkins-bot:
[mediawiki/core@master] RCFilters: Change main entry point text

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/387774

ReleaseTaggerBot added a project: MW-1.31-release-notes (WMF-deploy-2017-11-07 (1.31.0-wmf.7)).Nov 1 2017, 11:00 AM