Unified Admin Backend
aka revamp of the Admin Backend UIUser Interface and dashboard using an unified theme look & feel to achieve better UXUser eXperience of Tiki site adminstration.
There was a long and interesting discussion during the February 2021 TRM (see for more details: https://tiki.org/Roundtable-Meeting-2021-02)
In conclusion we agreed that if the interface was to be improved Tiki has most of the components needed to do (or start) it smoothly.
First step (done)
( @luciash d' being 🧙 , @Bernard Sfez / Tiki Specialist , @tsuki_katy , ...)
In Tiki we already have an "Admin theme" feature that make it easy to create a definitive solution or a proof of concept quickly and it is totally optional.
A future install option in Tiki was also mentioned (for admin choose Tiki classic theme or Tiki modern admin (naming?) )
We are working on first design proposal for the "Admin" theme and will put it here for review.
- Designed by @tsuki_katy (see below) in cooperation with @luciash d' being 🧙 (coordinator, mentor) the design was warmly welcomed and approved by the Tiki community
- The design was integrated and made as an optional feature for Tiki23 - enabled for fresh new installs only (to avoid issues for upgrades in case of custom layouts/themes)
Design Proposal
Suggested Features
(✔ = done, ✘ = rejected)
- ✔ While browsing the admin pages the Admin theme will be applied using the existing preference (which will be enabled on default installs)
- I request making this optional. I like using the site theme on admin pages also.
- No worries, it will be optional, just on fresh installs it will be enabled for newbies. We boomers can always switch it off with our luxury profiles or good ol' manual way ;)
- ✔ About color styling, I suggest using the Bootstrap .navbar-dark and .navbar-light classes to set the background, text, and link colors (as well as the dark/light switch option currently available for navbars). This way the coloring automatically works with whatever theme is used, and any new admin theme(s) can take advantage of existing classes, etc.
- Yes, as I wrote yesterday in one of the email messages on the devel list "Regarding the top bar we prefer to keep it in the dark gray color for dark navbar selection and maybe light gray for the light one" so we will do it like that (and if not you will be able to fix that for sure ;))
- I request making this optional. I like using the site theme on admin pages also.
- ✔ The admin navbar stays always visible at the top
- ✔ Removal of the admin anchors (small icons) from the top of the admin-include files and put the icons to the left sidebar (see the collapsible sliding left col below)
- ✔ Addition of a sliding left col (
based on the existing left col behaviorwe agreed that we will create special <aside> zone for it instead). That will display all the main features activated (based on the actual) and disabled ones with disabled class.
It was suggested this sliding menu to be always accessible (outside admins pages) for admins (optional)
[+]
Notes
- This area should be customizable with a "reset page" button
- Some charts would be nice (see the next step below)
- Modules page needs some work to adapt (for the new aside zone)
Q&A
- Question: what happens to the Quickadmin module — no changes for this, or is it redundant with this admin reorganization? Also, does this make the enhanced Quickadmin feature created by Bilal and Amna redundant? (Sorry, I forgot its name — it's the horizontal scrolling panel that slides down from the page top, containing admin icons, etc.) I'm in favor of simplifying if possible.
- No, nothing happens with these modules with this reorganization. Maybe we could include the quickadmin one in the top bar though if there will be enough space?
- Quick Administration module is included in the UAB top bar now
- No, nothing happens with these modules with this reorganization. Maybe we could include the quickadmin one in the top bar though if there will be enough space?
Feature Links Grouping Suggestion
[+]Second step
Fixing declared issues seen in Tiki23:
https://dev.tiki.org/Wishlist+Search+Page?default%7Esearch=unified+admin#search=unified+admin%20backend
-
https://dev.tiki.org/item7814-Fixed-Top-Menu-Classic-bootstrap-and-bottom-modules-are-lost-when-using-the-Admin-new-UI-Tiki23-defaultFixed in Fixed in https://gitlab.com/tikiwiki/tiki/-/merge_requests/1565 -
https://dev.tiki.org/item7844-Interactive-translation-top-bar-is-not-displayed-with-Bootstrap-classic-layoutFixed
Preliminary next step is revamp of the dashboard page:
- Dashboard / New Home for admin
Using existing data we have:- At glance (Tiki statistics)
- How many pages
- Files
- Items
- Last admin log (5 last users ?)
- ...
- Activity, last added content
- Get started (conditional)
- TBD (newbie tips closable for ever)
- Tiki communication
- Version, updates
- Important communication from Tiki Community
- At glance (Tiki statistics)
Third step
At the January 2022 Roundtable meeting, there was a consensus that the new admin backend shouldn't be on by default in new Tiki installations because of user experience issues that need to be corrected. So it should be off by default, but it will be activated at the Tiki project sites and issues identified in detail and corrected before the release of Tiki 25.
Issues to correct
(✔ = done, ✘ = rejected)
Bug reports should be filed for these and other issues to put them on the radar and ensure follow-ups. Priority should be set to make sure most important problems are fixed.
- Following some links in the Unified Admin backend, the user ends up at a page without the UAB navigation (only the standard modules / menus, etc.)
- Basically all the links under the Settings in the Main Menu module should probably be also part of the UAB theme - it could be done if we add the
tiki_admin
class to the body element for them too and maybe based on that apply the theme for these pages.
- Basically all the links under the Settings in the Main Menu module should probably be also part of the UAB theme - it could be done if we add the
- ✔
When the "bootstrap" layout (fixed top navbar) is active, the admin navbar overlaps its contents, which aren't removed because they are specified directly in the .tpl file, not in a module zone.Fixed in https://gitlab.com/tikiwiki/tiki/-/merge_requests/1565 - ✔
There are color conflicts between the admin CSS and theme CSS.Fixed in https://gitlab.com/tikiwiki/tiki/-/merge_requests/1565 - RTL issues (
stumbled upon bug with Farsi language - it is adding classFixed in https://gitlab.com/tikiwiki/tiki/-/merge_requests/1565)fa
to body which conflicts with Font Awesome class - ✔
Module Quick Admin overlaps the user/logout icon.Fixed in https://gitlab.com/tikiwiki/tiki/-/merge_requests/1565 - ....
-
For Inspiration
How other FLOSS projects do it?
PrestaShop
See their demo here: https://demo.prestashop.com/#/en/back
Open Project
(https://docs.openproject.org/system-admin-guide/) they are smaller, limited to 'project management' so only have 17 Features - yet they have a left side panel that assists in navigation:
--
Older Comments and Sections
Proposal to organize Control Panel Features into Sections
(originally introduced by Mike Finko, '@Mike Finko')
Purpose
(open for discussion)
- Difficulty in using the current (as of Tiki 22.x) Control Panels due to so many widely varying types of Features which are all uncategorized, e.g. unstructured
- Configurations can be enabled/disabled in multiple locations, adding to this confusion
- Difficulty in understanding the 'level of importance' of individual Features
- Difficulty in understanding 'what Tiki does' or 'where do I start' for new users due to the unstructured nature of the Control Panels
Goals
(open for discussion)
- Increase Control Panels ease of use for new users as well as long time users of Tiki
- Categorize, e.g. group in sections, all Features for easier 'on-boarding' of new users
- Allow for a faster learning curve for new users and higher retention rates of new users
- Increase future uniformity when adding new Features
- Create a central focus for Tiki on 'Core Modules' (as roughly stated here: https://info.tiki.org/Features) to improve marketability of Tiki as a product
Notes
- I know we discussed this before (most likely a TRM) but could not find any info about this on the Dev or Community sites - if I missed it somewhere, we can combine the pages.
- It was designed for 'full screen width' so doesn't look so great, here, sorry. Toggle the right module to 'Closed' and it will make viewing easier
- in any case, the Control Panel page looks custom coded page, so the html/css specialist that will be doing the actual re-vamp can make sure it looks perfect
- Icon - WebServices: since it is a 'cog' like General, I changed it to 'cloud-upload', since it involves the 'cloud', there is no 'cloud-upload-download' yet, and a Google search does not seem to indicate consensus, and no specific symbol in Font Awesome
- Icons Polls and Video: both slightly different, that's the closest I could find on Font Awesome
- I believe I included all the current Features, maybe only some experimental or deprecated ones are left out, two that I know I left out:
- Image Galleries - since this is listed as 'deprecated', I recommend we do not have the icon in the Control Panel as this just confuses users
- FAQ - in the 'Warning' it says "...there has been discussion about retiring this feature..." so let's retire it. Or, add it to the 'Deprecated' filter (e.g. Basic, Advanced, Experimental, etc.)
- I categorized them to the best of my abilities, I'm sure I overlooked a lot of things, please give your feedback for improvement.
- although the last few (Integration, Security, Miscellaneous) don't have many in them, my thinking was to leave room for expansion.
- After feedback and general consensus, we will need to update this page https://doc.tiki.org/Admin-Home
- we will need to limit the time for feedback, it cannot be 'forever' as no feedback should be considered a vote of 'approval'
Comparison (non-Tiki Admin Pages)
- We should consider how cPanel structured their 'Dashboard' due to the similarity of having a significant amount of Features - although it is a 'proprietary' software, it is generally considered a highly successful project. Three screenshots because it has so many Features:
Proposal
Enhanced Grid Display
This is a proposal to keep the admin icons in the grid so they are in a compact display, but to organize them, add a "header" for each section, and use color to differentiate the sections. This organization seems pretty good to me , but some things could be moved around. I used the standard Bootstrap button classes, so the effectiveness depends on the theme. Some themes could be improved in this regard.
Admin Panel-top Icons
The icons at the top of the admin pages that display without labels that correspond to the above reorganization would look something like this:
Bug reports
-
https://gitlab.com/tikiwiki/tiki/-/merge_requests/856fixed - Tiki.org admin panel difficult to use on mobile: tiki-download_wiki_attachment.php?attId=234&display
- Probably fixed on main. Fixes need to be backported to 24.x?
Suggested modification