On Wed, Feb 9, 2011 at 14:25, Marius Dumitru Florea < [email protected]> wrote:
> Hi Caty, > > On 02/09/2011 12:21 PM, Ecaterina Moraru (Valica) wrote: > > Hi, > > > > Since XE 3.0M2 we have a new administration look ( > > > http://www.xwiki.org/xwiki/bin/view/ReleaseNotes/ReleaseNotesXWikiEnterprise30M2 > ). > > > > There was a debate if the forms should be full width or not. > > > > *Variants*: > > 1) *Partial Width* (current): > > > http://incubator.myxwiki.org/xwiki/bin/download/Polls/AdministrationFormsfullwidthornot/partialWidth.png > > 2) *Full Width*: > > > http://incubator.myxwiki.org/xwiki/bin/download/Polls/AdministrationFormsfullwidthornot/fullWidth.png > > What's the benefit of enforcing the same width? I think I prefer the > width to depend on the size of the information displayed (for select > boxes) or expected to be entered (text input). For instance if I have a > text input for entering a small number I wouldn't like it to span the > entire page width. Same for a select box with options of small length > (e.g. Yes/No). > > Until the form standard, we had all kinds of sizes for text inputs, textareas, select boxes. This created a very messy/not standardized feeling. Test: remove "xform" class from <form class="xform half". Results: http://incubator.myxwiki.org/xwiki/bin/download/Polls/AdministrationFormsfullwidthornot/noStandardGeneral.png http://incubator.myxwiki.org/xwiki/bin/download/Polls/AdministrationFormsfullwidthornot/noStandardPresentation.png Having all controls the same width the form layout presents itself differently: it look compact, aligned and unitary. Beside the unitary look, you can have also some technical reasons. The other solution beside a 100% width for most of the controls, would have been to set some standardized sizes for each type of control. This sizes are already defined in "Size" column of the "Usage" category http://platform.xwiki.org/xwiki/bin/view/DevGuide/VerticalForms and are recommended to be used on future forms (and also to be modified on the old forms - already done for some forms I revised). The problem with this approach is that this means that we should have changed all the existing code that contained forms elements in order for the forms to look unitary and standardized. Also, some browsers (like IE) don't render the same width for different controls even if you specify the same size (ex. <input type='text' size='60' will be longer than <input type='password' size='60' ). So this means again different widths, more frustration (obs. even with width 100% for all controls, <select> is still rendered shorter). >From an usability point of view, the restricted cases where we should adjust the width of our form fields so it matches the length of the expected input are: credit card number (16 digits), credit card security code (4 digits), dates (2 digits + x + 4digits, but this case can be replaced with other solutions: date pickers, selects, etc). This are some of the cases where we know the exact size of the field and can act accordingly. Beside them, there are no rules and all is limited to what the developer/designer thinks fits the layout. We already have an exception for "Inline" layout forms ( http://platform.xwiki.org/xwiki/bin/view/DevGuide/InlineForms ) and we can make styles also for the cases mentioned above, but those cases are not encountered in XE standard distribution. Hope this answers the question, Caty > Thanks, > Marius > > > > > *Test*: You can test this "partial"/"full" width on your resolution by > > removing "half" class from "<form class='xform half"" definition. > > > > *Considerations*: > > - When voting please consider that the width will be set for small and > high > > resolutions (that until we will improve our skin to detect the > resolutions > > change). > > - You should consider how form controls look (readability, usability) on > > different sizes, like<select>, input, textarea, etc. > > > > *Other Solutions*: > > A. The problem is that on large resolution is hard to read the controls > > because the form are too wide - on small resolution there is unused > space. A > > solution would be to use CSS media queries and adjust the width for > smaller > > resolutions. > > B. Another solution would be to use the additional space given by the > > partial width and provide some extra help for the sections, see > > smaller resolution: > > > http://incubator.myxwiki.org/xwiki/bin/download/Polls/AdministrationFormsfullwidthornot/annotationSmall.png > > higher resolution: > > > http://incubator.myxwiki.org/xwiki/bin/download/Polls/AdministrationFormsfullwidthornot/annotationLarge.png > > > > *Vote*: > > You can use the poll made for this vote: > > > http://incubator.myxwiki.org/xwiki/bin/view/Polls/AdministrationFormsfullwidthornot > > or if you don't have an account on incubator, just reply to this mail. > > Please cast you votes. > > > > Thanks, > > Caty > > _______________________________________________ > > devs mailing list > > [email protected] > > http://lists.xwiki.org/mailman/listinfo/devs > _______________________________________________ > devs mailing list > [email protected] > http://lists.xwiki.org/mailman/listinfo/devs > _______________________________________________ devs mailing list [email protected] http://lists.xwiki.org/mailman/listinfo/devs
