{"action":"created","issue":{"url":"https://api.github.com/repos/sonnetmedia/brooklinebooksmith.com/issues/167","repository_url":"https://api.github.com/repos/sonnetmedia/brooklinebooksmith.com","labels_url":"https://api.github.com/repos/sonnetmedia/brooklinebooksmith.com/issues/167/labels{/name}","comments_url":"https://api.github.com/repos/sonnetmedia/brooklinebooksmith.com/issues/167/comments","events_url":"https://api.github.com/repos/sonnetmedia/brooklinebooksmith.com/issues/167/events","html_url":"https://github.com/sonnetmedia/brooklinebooksmith.com/issues/167","id":163448563,"number":167,"title":"Discussion on next iteration of the site","user":{"login":"budparr","id":115347,"avatar_url":"https://avatars.githubusercontent.com/u/115347?v=3","gravatar_id":"","url":"https://api.github.com/users/budparr","html_url":"https://github.com/budparr","followers_url":"https://api.github.com/users/budparr/followers","following_url":"https://api.github.com/users/budparr/following{/other_user}","gists_url":"https://api.github.com/users/budparr/gists{/gist_id}","starred_url":"https://api.github.com/users/budparr/starred{/owner}{/repo}","subscriptions_url":"https://api.github.com/users/budparr/subscriptions","organizations_url":"https://api.github.com/users/budparr/orgs","repos_url":"https://api.github.com/users/budparr/repos","events_url":"https://api.github.com/users/budparr/events{/privacy}","received_events_url":"https://api.github.com/users/budparr/received_events","type":"User","site_admin":false},"labels":[],"state":"open","locked":false,"assignee":null,"assignees":[],"milestone":null,"comments":17,"created_at":"2016-07-01T18:18:48Z","updated_at":"2016-07-11T13:03:08Z","closed_at":null,"body":"Hi @peterbooksmith\r\ncc/ @shuchibooksmith, @zchyde \r\n\r\nI'm opening this discussion for us to review progress on the next iteration of the site. \r\n\r\nMy goals with this iteration are:\r\n- **Improve the layout of the menu**\r\n  - Better accommodate many items (including the SFEBC).\r\n  - I applied a constraint to myself on this item of not hiding items behind a drop-down menu. I believe that your audience is less apt to click on hidden items.\r\n- **Make home page work harder**\r\n  - show more items in an easily scannable way.\r\n  -  make campaigns and special announcements fit naturally.\r\n  - improve display of bestsellers\r\n- **Improve workflow for content creators**\r\n  - Reduce dependency on featured images (make pages without them look better)\r\n  - improve editor experience (minor changes to improve clarity, but also make way to use the visual editor)\r\n- **Refactor codebase**\r\n  - Necessary to be more flexible and modular in the future. Primary goal is to simplify. This is a little hard to explain, but in earlier version we're more focused on getting your needs met, so now is an opportunity go back and see if we can improve on that initial work after reflection. This makes for a long-term more maintainable version of the site.\r\n  - improve performance (use a CDN for images), decrease javascript dependencies where possible.\r\n\r\nThis is a time consuming process (particularly refactoring), and I don't want to rush it, but I also want you to understand what's going on and not have to wait for a polished prototype. While we agreed showing a polished prototype was best for the internal BBS workflow, my normal workflow is more iterative (like this) and I like to show my work along the way. I think going back to that is the best bet (better than leaving you in the dark), and I'll let you manage your internal process as you see fit. \r\n\r\nHope that's okay, I just felt like I was not being as transparent as I'd like and felt like you might have been getting frustrated with me, while, in turn, I was merely afraid to show work-in-progress out of concern that it would cause extra work on your end, and possibly consternation, on the part of people inside the organization. Whew!\r\n\r\n---\r\n\r\n### Design iteration 1\r\n\r\nThe screenshot I'm posting here is an article page, just because there are fewer things to focus on. You'll note that the navigation is all on the side now. I went with a ton of iterations before arriving at the idea of making it \"app-like\" with the side navigation. This allows you to have a lot of menu items without having to hide any of them (_as I set as a requirement_), or break them up into multiple rows (as you may recall an earlier iteration of mine had).\r\n\r\nSo, as you can see, everything fits here and I think it's quite easy to navigate from section to section. I think it gives the site an element of clarity and makes the navigation items more noticeable and inviting, particularly since the side-nav stays fixed within view even while the reader is scrolling down, so they're never out of site.\r\n\r\nOn smaller mobile devices the menu will be hidden as it was before, but it also includes the address and phone number for quick access.\r\n\r\nAlso, the side-navigation solves another problem, albeit subtly. I wanted pages to look good without a \"featured image,\" however, a page without an image can be dull. The bright color of the side-navigation allows the page to have no image without being dull (the color spanning the height of the page livens it up). \r\n\r\nI'm attaching two versions. One with the nav on the left, and one with the right. I can change the side it's in about 10 seconds (owing to the newly refactored code-base), so which side isn't set in stone. I like them both. \r\n\r\nPutting the nav on the left feels more natural or intuitive, while putting it on the right feels like it gives the article more breathing room, putting the text more in the center of the page.\r\n\r\nAlso note that I removed the search box and put it together with giftcards. I did this because I feel that it's jarring for someone to come to the site, search and be led to a completely different site. When, earlier in the year, I had looked into making the shop site look like the main site, I felt like doing so would have been terribly time consuming (because Drupal uses a theme-based structure) and would have hurt our efforts on the main site. The theme you've chosen is better than what was there before, but it's still a jarring difference.\r\n\r\nI think the labeling is clear for the search/giftcard item (and putting it last on the menu gives it attention) and putting it on it's own dedicate page gives us the opportunity to add some copy to the page explaining that they're going to the shop site, and can give us another opportunity to display specials, etc.\r\n\r\nNote the prominent \"subscribe to mailing list\" button, which I separated from other menu items. I'm not married to the color, I just wanted something friendly here. The page itself is lighter than it appears in the screenshot, for some reason.\r\n\r\nHappy to hear your thoughts. You're welcome to show to anyone, of course, and give me feedback, but I don't want anyone to feel like this is formal or set in stone. That said, while I'm never set on anything, as you know, I do feel strongly that this side-navigation solves some problems for us, so I'd encourage everyone to not dismiss it too easily. \r\n\r\n<img width=\"1440\" alt=\"screen shot 2016-07-01 at 1 38 01 pm\" src=\"https://cloud.githubusercontent.com/assets/115347/16529849/193d2010-3f93-11e6-8f67-afa6a4a01407.png\">\r\n\r\n<img width=\"1440\" alt=\"screen shot 2016-07-01 at 1 24 26 pm\" src=\"https://cloud.githubusercontent.com/assets/115347/16529852/1f67af5a-3f93-11e6-8d9a-902c4606e8c3.png\">\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n"},"comment":{"url":"https://api.github.com/repos/sonnetmedia/brooklinebooksmith.com/issues/comments/231727718","html_url":"https://github.com/sonnetmedia/brooklinebooksmith.com/issues/167#issuecomment-231727718","issue_url":"https://api.github.com/repos/sonnetmedia/brooklinebooksmith.com/issues/167","id":231727718,"user":{"login":"budparr","id":115347,"avatar_url":"https://avatars.githubusercontent.com/u/115347?v=3","gravatar_id":"","url":"https://api.github.com/users/budparr","html_url":"https://github.com/budparr","followers_url":"https://api.github.com/users/budparr/followers","following_url":"https://api.github.com/users/budparr/following{/other_user}","gists_url":"https://api.github.com/users/budparr/gists{/gist_id}","starred_url":"https://api.github.com/users/budparr/starred{/owner}{/repo}","subscriptions_url":"https://api.github.com/users/budparr/subscriptions","organizations_url":"https://api.github.com/users/budparr/orgs","repos_url":"https://api.github.com/users/budparr/repos","events_url":"https://api.github.com/users/budparr/events{/privacy}","received_events_url":"https://api.github.com/users/budparr/received_events","type":"User","site_admin":false},"created_at":"2016-07-11T13:03:08Z","updated_at":"2016-07-11T13:03:08Z","body":"@shuchibooksmith here's some of the research I mentioned earlier, if you care to read it (not required!). This is from one of the most well-known user experience research firms in the industry:\r\n[Hamburger Menus and Hidden Navigation Hurt UX Metrics](https://www.nngroup.com/articles/hamburger-menus/)\r\n\r\nOf course, nothing is absolute. This is just food for thought so you can see how we try to make the best decisions for our audience."}}
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