Suggestions: Profile tabs enhancements

Question

Chris had asked about some possible upcoming changes to the WikiTre profile tabbed interface. I had some comments/feedback, looking for any additional input:

- The 'years ago' display on birthdate was briefly added and then removed. A better calculation would be the age at marriage, death, and even when each child is born. This would help prevent obvious invalid/improbable date relationships.

- I rarely use the Changes, Privacy, and Photos tab. I'd prefer to see those replaced by the Family Group and Descendants view, with some small link from the edit page to see change history privacy and photos.

I find the public/private view tabs very similar, and can be confusing , I'd prefer something like a button to switch (dynamically show/hide) information between the public and private view on the same tab, eliminating one tab from the top.

Comments

I love the idea Chris mentioned earlier of some 'Age Calculation Widget'  and Bob's suggestion on how it would be helpful to see how the ages of  people were when they got married  and/or had children and died so WikiTreers can catch mistakes as they work on their ancestry profiles or doing merges , ect.

I am a TABS person. Use every one of them everyday .. I think they are useful , esp. for newbies to get started.

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I like the 'Age Calculation Widget' concept, too.

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I think that if the Photos Tab is removed, maybe the link to add new photos could be brought to the top/right of the page, instead of half way down (on the edit tab page). That would make the Photo Tab obsolete for sure...

The Age Calculation Widget does sound convenient too!

Trib

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Bob, I don't think you answered my e-mailed question about whether doing the ages on a separate widget/tool would suit your needs. It's less convenient than having it automatically appear on all profiles but would save resources, download time, etc.

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My preference would be to show it on the profile tab next to the marriage and death dates i.e. 'married June 1868 at <location> (age 31)' 'Father of X Y (age 25)' 'Died 1916 in <location> (age 79)". Unless the calculation is too resource intensive, or there are some suggestions about what the widget would look like (some popup in the same window, which wouldn't require opening or closing more tabs?). As a compromise, at least show the age info in the Family Group View, that's where we can easily see everything together and find simple age-related mistakes.

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It could make sense to do the age at marriage and age at death on the profile page, then have the ages at which they had children on the family group page.

Answer 1

Some time back, a WikiTreer mentioned it would be quite an enhancement if the profile page had the look of a book page. I don't know if that would take frames or what, but people could print a profile page and all that would show up on the hard copy would be actual family tree data and pictures instead of the collateral information. We could still have tabs and any other needed information, it just wouldn't show up in the printed copy. I don't remember who it was that suggested this, but it sounded like a good idea. Since I'm not familiar with the technical aspects of WikiTree, that may be too difficult a task to consider.

I use the privacy tab quite a lot. It looks like there would be room for two more tabs if the 'invite others' and the privacy lock were moved up a little.

I don't think I've ever used the photo tab. If I want to see photo information, I click on the photo. I could see where the photo tab could be very useful if all the uploaded photos from every profile one managed could be viewed with one click of the tab. In other words, if it linked to a family album.

The public/private view tabs have never caused me a problem, but your idea about the show/hide button sounds like a good one.

Answer 2

I definitely wouldn't want the Changes and Privacy tabs relegated to links on the Edit page. I use those tabs a LOT, and wouldn't want an extra click through the Edit page to get to them. The only tab I don't use all the time is Photos, since my profiles don't typically have more photos than can fit on the profile page anyway.

I don't mind if we move away from tabs, as long as I can still get to the pages I need from the profile page.

Comments

I have to agree with Lianne on this one... The Changes Tab, I find especially convenient. Sometimes, all I have is a couple of minutes to see what someone changed in my profile. Mike Lechner helped me out by editing a mistake on a whole lot of my biographies. Though I trust his edits, I wanted to jump on and check out exactly what was changed. As a Profile Manager, that is your responsibility. It would be a good idea, I think, to keep the fact that RESPOSIBILITY of your profiles are a big part of what this is about. Changes can make you or break you in the WikiTree game.

As respect to privacy, I do not think that removing the tab would be a HUGE loss, but I think it sends the wrong message. Though WikiTree principles are clear about where we all stand with living people's privacy, as WikiTree grows (and I know it will), we should have that Tab on our profiles out of principle more than convenience.

Trib

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Interesting points, Ray. Thanks.

I'm hoping to add a second navigation bar beneath the tabs soon. This is a quick fix to solve the problem of the tiny icons. Person-related pages need a more significant redesign, including a clearer and more coherent person-specific navigation system. But that has to be done carefully and we're overloaded with other priorities right now.

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Thinking about it some more, it would be fine to simply tweak the profie edit page instead, where I spend the vast majority of my time, these would significantly improve the navigability from that screen to all related profiles. These are all in the 'Edit Family' section of the page.

1. For father, mother, and each spouse add the small icons for tree view and family group view, next to the [edit] link, which shows the tree or group view for that related profile.

2. For each sibling and child add the icons for descendant list and family group view next to the [edit] link, again for that specific profile. Similar to what we have in the family group view.

2A If not too calculation intensive, only show the icons if they are applicable, i.e. don't show a family tree icon if no parents are attached, don't show descendants or family group if no spouse and children are attached. This could be a later enhancement.

3. Add the pending merges and umnerged matches list somewhere on the page, i.e. below the list of children. I don't really need to see the rejected matches. Sort them in order with the lowest numbered ones first.

4. If two spouses or siblings or children have the same name and are not rejected matches, a compare shortcut for the two to make merging easier. Just show it next to the higher numbered profile with the lowest numbered profile as the target profile.

I think these would be more easily navigable than a second navigation bar which would appliy only to the specific profile I am working on. It would also be easier to pick out the icon you need if there are only two together, rather than the 12 that are next to each other on the profile view page.

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Hi Bob,

Regarding #4, I assume you know you can do this by clicking the "show merge options" link?

We could make #3 part of the merge options that appear. I wonder how many other people would find this useful. Can you explain more your workflow, i.e. why it's important to have this stuff on the edit page in addition to the bottom of the profile?

Same goes for #1 and #2. We could add those links, but they add clutter. Especially because #2A would be hard without adding extra processing. Plus we already do this processing on the tree pages. The icons by parents, siblings, spouses, and children on the tree pages are all conditional. How come what you're doing can't be done from the tree page?

Also, note that we're already working on the extra row of icons. That's in the works.

Chris

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The purpose of adding the icons and the pending/matched profile to the edit page would be to not have to switch back to the profile view page, saving one or more extra clicks (submit/response to the server), Also to be able to navigate to the tree or group view for any of the related profiles easily from the edit page. The extra row of icons would apply only to the profile currently being worked on, not the related profile. Again, just making it easier to navigate to where I want to go without having to go through the tree page.

I guess the merge options would do what I need for #4, I see that it opens the compare in a new window/tab which is what I would want.

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Bob & Co: Check out the changes just introduced today, and comment here or on http://www.wikitree.com/g2g/26519/new-links-on-profile-page if you have any new suggestions or problems to report. Thanks!