Action Bar Feedback
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I have been a Volunteer for testing of the action bar. Although I am a desktop user and want the action bar links to all be moved back to the Admin bar, I am not holding my breath and expecting that to happen. These changes are made to accommodate mobile and tablet users.
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Good point, timethief. And true, WP is making these changes to accommodate mobile and tablet users.
Thanks for being one of the volunteer beta testers.
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Speaking from 3 decades of professional experience with computers, I can say emphatically that the new Action Bar is not friendly or intuitive for anybody using Firefox on a Win 7 computer.
Before the Action Bar was introduced, the [Like] and [Follow] buttons that were in the black bar at the top of my browser window were easy to find. Now the real estate those buttons occupied is wasted with black space and the Action Bar clutters the content. Yes, I know the bar can be collapsed by clicking the 3 dots. The collapsed bar is still clutter. Once, after uncollapsing the bar in search of a [Like] button, I accidentally UNfollowed a blog I follow by clicking too far to the left when I recollapsed the bar. So I had to refollow that blog and then respecify my notification options. That was a waste of my time. Having to remember whether to look in the black bar or the Action Bar (or my coat closet?) for an action is an ongoing waste of my memory.
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Either move everything back to the top bar or move everything to the action bar. But to have both is a distracting waste of screen estate.
But on the positive side: I do like the design. It looks very nice :)
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The like button will appear under a post on the site that you’re viewing unless the author has removed it. Unrelated to the action bar, likes are available separately in the Reader since one of the main functions there is liking and keeping track of posts you have liked.
We’re working on some changes to reblogging. It will come back in the future in a better form but I am not sure when.
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I agree wi michaelvandenberg’s 2015-08-28 comment. Of course there is no room for everything to appear explicitly, but access to everything should come from 1 place.
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Commonly used video controls illustrate a coherent approach to the problem of making controls available but unobtrusive on a small screen. Hover over roughly the bottom fifth of the video to make the controls appear; hover elsewhere and they disappear. For blogging, some of the controls would need to display menus rather than offer direct control of pause/play or volume. The principle is the same.
I would prefer that the availability of currently invisible controls be hinted at by a truly intuitive icon (such as 2 meshing gears of unequal size) that is always visible and could be clicked on; the total invisibility of hidden video controls was puzzling when initially encountered.
With or w/o something always visible, all controls should be accessible from one place.
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@designsimply
I did not spot this sticky post right away and there are other
action bar feedback threads. -
I agree that the action bar should be at the top as well IF we really have a need for it but I don’t see that we do. It seems like overkill. We have a menu bar at the top that gives us all the actions we need. The last thing I want to see on my site or others when I visit, is yet another menu, action or toolbar. It’s detracting from content in an unpleasant way.
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I cannot find how to get to Short Link. I read the link on action Bar, Follow, Customize/Edit which to me is annoying. No Follow on my blog, why would I want to follow my own blog. I do not understand.
I don’t understand why WP keeps changing things making it more and more complicated. I want the short link back. I cannot find it. This is very frustrating.
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@longshotsblues, there are many reasons to follow your own blog. One is to see how it looks on the Reader, another is to see if the email notifications are working properly.
The Short link should be listed on the new Action bar. It is also on the editor, at least while using the more functional classic editor.
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The Short link should be listed on the new Action bar. It is also on the editor, at least while using the more functional classic editor.
I just checked my own site, and the shortlink appears in neither the Action bar nor the Admin bar at the top of the screen.
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dandelionsalad
We shouldn’t have to go to editor to get it. It was on left side in administration , should have left it there but again it is not on new action/customize/edit bar. So can WP please put it back.
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It’s still working on my blog in the new Action Bar. It must be a technical bug that it’s not working on either of yours.
I’d prefer not to have the Action Bar on my blog at all and have already commented on this thread my preference.
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It’s still working on my blog in the new Action Bar. It must be a technical bug that it’s not working on either of yours.
Hang on! My mistake. I checked the home page, which doesn’t have a shortlink. On single-post views it’s in the action bar as it’s supposed to be.
@longshotblues, perhaps check if you didn’t make the same mistake as me. Click on a post title to view a specific post. Then you should see the shortlink when you expand the action bar.
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Once again I Do Not have the shortlink Anywhere.
Expand how, click on Edit? That’s having to take 20 steps backwards. It was under My Site. There’s a customize which does not contain shortlink and all edit does is go to edit the blog when it doesn’t need editing.
This is ridiculous.
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The fact that roughly similar remarks are accumulating in 2 places (here and as comments on the Action Bar post) is symptomatic of a broader interface problem with WordPress.
Great functionality is provided, but accessing more than the most elementary stuff involves many steps. Different long paths sometimes lead to different implementations of roughly the same functionality, be it managing comments or editing posts. Better to have just one really good implementation and a few straightforward ways to access it.
I have enough experience in SW engineering to know that getting to that blessed state is a hard slog, and that perfection is not of this world. I also know that there is danger in letting large systems grow wildly, with many rough duplications, many linkages, and many hasty responses to narrow problems “solved” by adding more code w/o adequate consideration of the context that generates those problems.
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Well I started the other post before I saw this one, so I came here. It wasn’t done purposely.
I just want the short link back without having to go to the edit part to get it. It was simple to gain it from where it was under My Site.
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@longshotsblues, just to be clear, are you clicking on the Action Bar on the blog post that you want the shortlink and clicking on the 3 dots (…/ellipses)?
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