19 December 2014, 7:36

Hi Mahara community,

A much requested feature for Mahara is having a 'copy page' button directly on a page that you as a user are allowed to copy (see Bug #745418).

So we, at Mahara HQ, have decided to get this feature in for the next release (15.04) but first we would like to have some feedback about how you would like to see button work.

At the community developer meeting last night there was some discussion on this feature.

You can read about it in the meeting minutes but to summarise the main points were:

1) Placement:

- should the button be prominent vs subtle?

- top right versus footer versus somewhere else?

- have it so a theme can position it where ever it likes without much fuss.

2) Function process:

- can one back out of the copy process if the button is accidentally clicked?

- should there be a confirm dialogue or will more clicks make the process less smooth?

- if the page is part of a collection should the user be allowed to choose to copy the collection versus just the page?

- having the copying use the same work-flow as the current copy a page screen or not?

3) Mobility:

- how the process will work on desktop versus mobile device.

So if you in the community have ideas of how you would like this to work, or if you have implemented something like this for your Mahara then we would love to hear from you.

Cheers

Robert

20 December 2014, 9:38

Hi Robert,

In my own dream world..

What I believe would be the most useful way is to have a box at the bottom when creating the collection/page (just like the current tick box for top navigation with collections) that shows you want that collection/page to be 'copyable'. The button can then sit somewhere in the top right (I'm not a dev or designer - I only create activities that use it...

I'm pretty sure myself, Roger and Chris could probably spend a good amount of time on this either on mon/tues next week or when we're back after the break.

So so pleased it's being addressed! It'll make life so much easier :) Thanks you!!!

(PS - as with another issue our students have - if only I could attached/embed an images into this post to explain what I'm babbling about...)

29 December 2014, 16:14

Hi Sam,

Thank you for your reply. Mike Kelly is working on an easier way to embed images that have already been uploaded to Mahara...

As for the copyable option: You are addressing a different aspect: That of adding the copyable when creating the page instead of during the access permissions. This would need to be looked at separately I think because it is a different matter than providing a button for people who have the permission to copy a page / collection. :-) I created https://bugs.launchpad.net/mahara/+bug/1406170 for it so we can track it better.

Looking forward to more insight from you, Roger and your team.

Cheers

Kristina

21 December 2014, 5:08

My two cents;

Placement: prominent and top right, similar to 'edit this page'

Function process: cancel button is nice, no dialogue required, great to have choice of copying page only or entire collection and use same workflow.

What about after page is copied? User will be on copied page correct? Is it possible to have a button there that says, 'Continue where you left' to be returned to the previously copied page? I am asking because the user was in some sort of 'browsing or search mode' ie. looking at other peoples stuff. They may want to continue that process before actually modifying the copied page. So in a sense, I can browse the site, come across interesting pages, notice that I can copy them, and then do so, but then my browsing task is interrupted. It would be good if there was an opportunity to be looped back to the starting point of this process. Finally, if there was the capacity for the system to tell me 'you have already copied this page/collection in the past year.....' this would be a great feature to have but probably beyond the scope of this work at the moment .
I realize this is a different approach to copying to how many folks seem to want it, which is a easy way to copy defined templates but I thought it is worth bringing it up here.

29 December 2014, 16:17

Hello Dirk,

Thank you very much for your thoughts on the topic. You bring up a good point about where to end up after the copying. Currently, they would be on the copied page / collection and continue from there. We'd have to see how difficult it would be to implement your idea (we'd also want to avoid too many pop-ups / dialogue boxes etc.). What if, maybe as an alternative (for the time being), the copied page / collection would be opened in a new tab? Would your users work with tabs and know to get back to another tab or is that something not even to consider?

We use the "open in a new tab" functionality when adding a journal entry directly on a page.

Cheers

Kristina

02 January 2015, 12:59

Hi Kristina,
the 'open in new tab' is a good idea but not sure what others are thinking. I think combined with leaving the 'Copy of...' title renaming function, which of course is an admin decision, this would be a nice workaround.

23 December 2014, 5:30

I think this would be a good addition to simplify the use of templates for classes, which is popular feature in many ePortfolio systems.

As instructor for a course, I could set up a page or a collection for my class to use for their course portfolios, share the page/collection appropriately, and then just provide the url to my class with the direction to copy it into their accounts.  I think that would be more straightforward than the current situation.

29 December 2014, 16:19

Hello Keith,

Your use case is exactly the one that is coming up quite a bit and would improve the work flow of copying a page / collection very much.

Do you have a preference for the placing of the button and some of the other things that Robert had mentioned?

Cheers

Kristina