19 August 2010, 17:46

To discuss items for the v1.4 upgrade described in the mahara roadmap wiki

17 September 2010, 6:16

Hi all,

Getting in early with thoughts for 1.4 - probably nothing new :)

I think in terms of the UI the biggest improvement I could hope for would be an improvement to the workflow based on the layout of the tabs. The new 'dashboard' view has been a great help - the visual prompts are brilliant - but I think the order of the tabs to me still doesn't seen to make sense.

I could suggest the order that I'd lay out the tabs, but I wonder if it would be better to get a specialist UI designer to have a look at it and share an opinion. This is even more important now that we have Collections in there as well - for me it almost seems like there should be a flow from artefacts to views to collections (broadly) as a starting point.

My thoughts only :)

Mark.

17 September 2010, 8:02

Something that I've included in my previous customizations of the previous releases, is to change the order of tab displays after clicking on My Portfolio.  For me - it seems the primary objective would be to enter My Portfolio and be presented with quick ways to write new reflections and also quickly see those I've written recently.  So, I changed the first tab to be open in 1.2.5 to be My Blogs.  Admittedly I havn't yet changed this default in 1.3.0, perhaps because of the new dashboard. 

However, I'm also interested in seeing a more rapid entry into reflective writing from the Dashboard, and am currently considering writing a "My Recent Blog Activity" module for the dashboard - which would display the most recent blogs I've written into, and a one click ability to write a new post within that blog. Enhancing the pathways toward reflection I belive are important.  Currently in 1.3.0, without the Dashboard Mahar Info Panel, writing a new blog post is three clicks deep.

In conversations with a colleague, we're also thinking of changes "Blogs" to "Journals"... as the fact that they are private until shared in a View, and there's no way to make them public without a View - the term Journal seems more approriate. I don't know if the terminology around "Blogs" has been considered previously.

17 September 2010, 8:10

Hi Tim,

A recent blog activity blocktype would be really handy. Do you intend to submit this upstream?

Personally, I feel that keeping the term 'blog' is more beneficial as it's more widely understood. Obviously though, you could make local language customisations using the local directory. I'd like to make it easier to make a blog public too - perhaps a user blog page so that you can publish your mahara blog more easily. I'm not sure whether this is really within the scope for an ePortfolio system though...

Andrew

17 September 2010, 10:56

If we're able to successfully complete the "Recent Blog Activity" blocktype we would certainly send it upstream for those who are interested.  We'll also hoping to add code to producing a notifications report called "Feedback Given", so tutors and students can remember what they said as previous feedback.   We'll send anything that seems helpful upstream, as you say.

Another possible project we're considering is a "Quick Share" button, which could be available on a Blog, or Blog-post, and would pull up a small window to enter a title, description and Access settings, to automatically create a 1 column View for seeking feedback. 

17 September 2010, 19:48

Hi Tim,
I agree with your thinking here and also the name change - see the following for my ideas on that - more work-shopping to do on it though

http://wiki.mahara.org/Roadmap/1_Look_and_Feel

cheers

17 September 2010, 19:57

Hello,

Work on the UI of 1.4 has not yet seriously started as 1.3 needed to get off the ground first. The next few weeks should bring some clearer idea of timeframes and we will share them here.

In regard to UI improvements: While a UI expert definitely sounds good, I still think that Mahara users can and should contribute their thoughts around the workflows as well as you know the system best and know what you are using most frequently etc. Thus, the information that Tim provided as well as his development plans will be of great help for further discussions.

Cheers

Kristina