More integrated help for end user

spirelli · Post by **spirelli** » Fri 4. Feb 2005, 12:25

I just love the presence of the HEPL button that is present at some places in the backend at the moment.

I wish it would appear more often, in order for the end user (editor) to get more hints and feel more comfortabel using the backend. For instance when creating an article the different fields could be explained briefly. I know, there is the documentation site, but it would be nuch better if a short discribtion was right there and then.

Pappnase · Post by **Pappnase** » Fri 4. Feb 2005, 13:08

hello barilla

nice idea but who should serve the content for the help system and! how big should the package be. always remember there also analog modem users!

spirelli · Post by **spirelli** » Fri 4. Feb 2005, 13:47

Well I just think it could be small pop-up pages
as it is with what is there at the moment. So a
pop-up with a text/icon only describtion.
Similar to what's on the docu page, but possibly
a bit shotented. So this is how it could be for
creating an article:

article title(required):
The main title of the article.

hide:
Hide article title on full article display.

sub-title:
A subtitle for the article.

begins: …ends:
Date and time of the period in which
the article will be displayed. These
fields will be filled in automatically if
you leave them blank.

redirect to:
Automatically redirect the viewer to
a different page, either external
(e.g. http://www.google.com/)
or internal (e.g. "index.php?directlink").

keywords:
Keywords are found by the local search
function of the site. Useful if you would like
to associate certain keywords with the article.

status:
Set to both "visible" and "public" to make the
article visible on the website.

...

This page can of cause be longer.
This could be just a few plain text html files.
then the webmaster could even customize.
If there was a help icon [?] at different places
of the page then there could be anchors in the
HTML file in order to jump to the relevant place.
Then one would be able to manage with only a
few HTML files.

I just feel that an editor might feel more
comfortable using the system if they could have
a small hint for each field and be assured of
what the field does and possibly in what format
to enter the data.

pmachine used to have something like this and
I thought it was quite helpful.

jaapbezemer · Post by **jaapbezemer** » Fri 4. Feb 2005, 13:56

I totally agree with spirelli.
For me it would also save a lot of time if my customers had little hints on how to use the different functions.
If content creation is a problem, we could satifsfy with a system as described by spirelli in wich we could ad custom help messages.
one single xml type list could satisfy for alle the different help messages.
This way we could also use different languages.

For now a lot of functionality and user friendlyness is laid aside because development is done be one single person.
I respect the ambitions and filosophy of oliver, but sometimes it is better to let the entire community participate in the approvement of this magnificent piece of software.

If Oliver concentrates on the implemetation of the help-messages, the community could focus on the content of the messages and could point out the places where these messages would be most helpfull.

frold · Post by **frold** » Fri 4. Feb 2005, 14:52

spirelli wrote:Well I just think it could be small pop-up pages
as it is with what is there at the moment.

I have made that in my system with "overall lib" and I think it will be somethings like that in later releases...

if your go to phpwcms.php and view source you can see it load somethings like it:

</table>
<script src="include/inc_js/wz_js/wz_tooltip.js" type="text/javascript"></script>
</body>
</html>

brans · Post by **brans** » Wed 16. Feb 2005, 14:34

hmm I really think there was no problem to integrate some help buttons which link directly to phpwcms-docu.de ?!?

This was just some traffic issue, I don't know if this was ok for pappnase.

Pappnase · Post by **Pappnase** » Thu 17. Feb 2005, 02:44

brans wrote:hmm I really think there was no problem to integrate some help buttons which link directly to phpwcms-docu.de ?!?

This was just some traffic issue, I don't know if this was ok for pappnase.

hehe

i have 50GB traffic for the docusite per month so it should be enough

and if not may some donation will help

brans · Post by **brans** » Thu 17. Feb 2005, 10:32

Ok so why not taking this possibility ?

The only thing was, that the docu wouldn't be useful for users of veeeeery old versions, but I really think they won't need it anymore. Otherwise they could come to this forum to ask

spirelli · Post by **spirelli** » Thu 17. Feb 2005, 22:55

I don't feel so happy with this suggestion as the docu site cover things quite extensively. There is a lot of content on one page. It's a good place to read upn and go into detail. However, what I was thinking about was an quick, instant help that just is a smaller pop-up presenting the specific description for a field or area that is being worked on. Linking to a page on the docu site I find not as neat, tidy and efficient. Does this make sense?
It also eliminates the possibility for the webmaster to custumise the help items specific to the site.

Pappnase · Post by **Pappnase** » Fri 18. Feb 2005, 01:11

brans wrote: Ok so why not taking this possibility ?

The only thing was, that the docu wouldn't be useful for users of veeeeery old versions, but I really think they won't need it anymore. Otherwise they could come to this forum to ask

hello

someday is the day where zou need to upgrade!