The Glowfic Constellation

[DanielH]

For logged-out users, the login boxes (and password reset etc.) can be moved up on to the same line as the logo; this would take care of some of the vertical space problems. I think there might also be more vertical padding than ideal, but I’m not a graphics designer either so take that with a grain of salt.

In any case, I think the logo should be moved to the left, because it is Standard for the website logo to be in the upper-left and be a link to the homepage. That would matter more if there was anything worth looking at on the home page.

[Unbitwise]

Well, speaking of vertical space, if it were up to me, I would remove the “Continuities Recently Updated Search …” bar from individual pages — since it's not at all about reading this thread. Focus on the content.

[Kappa]

Site navigation is important. Like, really important.

[Unbitwise]

Relevant navigation is important. But there are ways to do it that don't waste space with generic side-or-top-bars. Like, right now, there are two links to “Continuities”. The second one is in the hierarchical navigation (e.g. “Continuities » Sandboxes & Oneshots » Throw the bookholder at them”), so it is fitting into something that actually displays relevant information as well. The first one can just go away without losing anything.

[Kappa]

No, changing the contents of the top navigation bar depending on what's visible in the breadcrumbs would mean that the locations of individual links in the top navigation bar would be inconsistent.

[DanielH]

I am not a graphic designer but I do try to pay attention to UI design for functionality and I have to agree with Kappa here. All that stuff needs links somewhere accessible and, at least within a given layout, that location should not change on different pages.

There could be a layout where it was all hidden in a menu, or where it was on a sidebar instead of taking vertical space. Maybe there could even be a layout without some of the links as long as it was not the default.

How much of a problem is the vertical space thing? Once you scroll down past the first screenful none of it is visible, so if it's particularly annoying you could see 500 posts per page and rarely need to deal with it? We should definitely improve the content:header ratio of that first screen, but I’m not sure what the priority should be.

[Unbitwise]

I did not mean to propose that the first link be removed conditionally. I'm saying that the second link is a Good Example (because it is integrated into the information the page is displaying) and the first is a Not Particularly Good Example.

[Unbitwise]

No, changing the contents of the top navigation bar depending on what's visible in the breadcrumbs would mean that the locations of individual links in the top navigation bar would be inconsistent.

I did not mean to propose that the first link be removed conditionally. I'm saying that the second link is a Good Example (because it is integrated into the information the page is displaying) and the first is a Not Particularly Good Example.

How much of a problem is the vertical space thing? Once you scroll down past the first screenful none of it is visible, so if it's particularly annoying you could see 500 posts per page and rarely need to deal with it?

I admit it is primarily an aesthetic preference. But, for example, I just looked at this page on my phone: the entire first screenful is all navigation of some sort. There are no words of the actual story at all on the screen. That's ridiculous. Look at me, ridiculing it right now.

And going to 500 posts is problematic if your browsing circumstances are such that you can't guarantee not losing your scroll position.

[DanielH]

True, phones make things harder. My thoughts of using less vertical space by using the horizontal space more efficiently also don’t work for phones. I think more stuff could go in a menu you need to click to open, like the one to get post stats and flat HTML?

Agh, I never noticed this before, but it is now going to keep bugging me every time I read a Constellation thread.

[Unbitwise]

Okay, I poked at creating a mockup but it's going to be a lot more thinking and HTML fiddling than I have time for right now to make a really good example, so I'll just write down some basic vertical-space-friendliness ideas:

• Move the abovementioned navigation links into the same header row as the "Glowfic" logo. (I think this was mentioned already.) Even if it wrapped to three lines of text next to the logo, it would fit into less vertical space.
• Replace the login form with just a link in the navigation — it's wasted space for anyone who doesn't have an account.
• "Total" and "Posts Per Page" are not essential functionality, so perhaps have them only in the bottom-of-page navigation and not the top-of-page navigation.

Oh, and here's a screenshot of the current situation on my phone.

Also, this is not really at all related, but it would be nice if the inter-page navigation put more emphasis on the "‹ Previous" and "Next ›" links, for example by making them big targets out to the left and right edges of the page. As it is, on a phone they are almost exactly as hard to use as trying to hit the neighbors of the current page number. Not saying make it a Big Fat Touchscreen Button, just separate them out from the number text and use some of the white space that is currently margin as clickable area.