Closed Bug 396581 Opened 17 years ago Closed 17 years ago

Automatically gather and manually prompt users for important pieces of information

Categories

(support.mozilla.org :: Forum, task)

task
Not set
normal

Tracking

(Not tracked)

VERIFIED FIXED

People

(Reporter: jason.barnabe, Assigned: jason.barnabe)

References

Details

(Whiteboard: sumo_only)

Attachments

(2 files, 2 obsolete files)

Blocks: 397701
No longer blocks: 397701
Attached file functional mockup (obsolete) —
An updated version.

-Fewer questions being asked
-Will only show the "Are you currently using the Firefox instance that you're having problems with?" if the result of isUsingFirefox is true. No use asking that question if we know the answer. isUsingFirefox currently always returns true.
-"Are you currently using the Firefox instance that you're having problems with?" doesn't disappear when the users answers.
-"Are you currently using the Firefox instance that you're having problems with?" doesn't appear if JavaScript is disabled.
-Includes an OS prettifier, for "Windows 5.1" -> "Windows XP" conversion. Only includes Linux prettification at the moment.
Attached file Even simpler mockup (obsolete) —
Jason, I took your page and made a few more changes. It's just a proposal, but I think it makes the page easier to follow for our users. Nevermind the ugliness and weird html/css. Here are the changes:

* The page appears as a 1-2-3 step by step instruction, with big numbers at the beginning of each step. This makes it easy to follow and makes the page appear less overwhelming. 
* Removed the "What you're expecting to happen, and what really happens" item. It's too Bugzilla-like and I think the user will explain the problem anyway.
* Removed "What have you already tried to solve your problem?". I don't think it's needed, but if it really is, it can just be an item in the list of "things you can include".
* Moved the screenshot item to the bottom of step 3. It's the most confusing one for people who don't know what a screenshot is (those people exist).
* Added a border around step 3. Actually I think all three items should have some kind of border, but I wanted to make it visually clear that the items in step 3 are all extra, optional information that can _help us help_ but is not necessary.
* Removed the yes/no question about the Firefox instance. First of all, the language was confusing (user: "what the heck is an instance?"), and second, it can might as well be prefilled automatically and still editable. Made the script run on page load. If necessary, we can make it clear to the user that the values are prefilled for his/her convenience, but that he/she should review it and edit it if necessary. However, I think it's fine as it is.
* Removed "Which themes do you use?". It's just confusing and will rarely be usable for us. Besides, you're only using one theme at the time, so the text box could be a one liner if we needed it.
Target Milestone: --- → 0.3
Blocks: 396817
Can people try out the latest mockup and tell me what value it gives for the OS and what OS they actually use?
Value: Intel Mac OS X 10.5
What I use: Mac OS X Leopard
(I also think the Intel part is valuable info to have.)
Value: Windows NT 5.1
What I used: Windows XP Pro (via Parallels)
Value: Linux
What I used: Ubuntu Linux 7.10 (via Parallels)
https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/attachment.cgi?id=283497

Value: Mac OS X 10.4
Actual: Intel Mac OS X 10.4

Value: Windows NT 6.0
Actual: Windows Vista

Looks good! It got the Firefox versions right, and the plugins listed are just the "Default Plug-in" in Vista and "Netscape Navigator Default Plug-in" in Mac OS.
Thanks for the feedback on the OSes. I'll have the Windows values convert to something more understandable.

(In reply to comment #7)
> Looks good! It got the Firefox versions right, and the plugins listed are just
> the "Default Plug-in" in Vista and "Netscape Navigator Default Plug-in" in Mac
> OS.

That's because when you made the second mockup, you switched it to a single line text field. All the data's there, but it's separated by newlines so you don't see it unless you scroll through the field.

I'm going to update the mockup to fix these things. I'll also write up a sample output. Then nelson will take over.
(In reply to comment #8)
> Thanks for the feedback on the OSes. I'll have the Windows values convert to
> something more understandable.
> 
> (In reply to comment #7)
> > Looks good! It got the Firefox versions right, and the plugins listed are just
> > the "Default Plug-in" in Vista and "Netscape Navigator Default Plug-in" in Mac
> > OS.
> 
> That's because when you made the second mockup, you switched it to a single
> line text field. All the data's there, but it's separated by newlines so you
> don't see it unless you scroll through the field.
> 

Does the plugin info need to be visible at all? Is anyone going to modify the contents of that text box? The less info upfront to the user, the better.
Attached file another mockup
-Adds detection for Windows XP and Vista
-Adds the logic for isUsingFirefox. It will likely match other Gecko browsers, but it's the best I can think of at the moment.
-Hides the plugin field. We're not offering users steps on how to get this info, so if we can't detect it, we'll just do without.

So something like this should be put in the place of the Create New Topic in the Firefox Support forum *only*, not other forums. The "briefly describe your problem" because the thread title, all the other text gets appended together as the body of the post. Something like:

The detail part of the text. The detail part of the text. The detail part of the text. The detail part of the text. The detail part of the text. The detail part of the text. The detail part of the text. 

---
Firefox version: 2.0.0.11
Operating system: Linux
Extensions:
 - NoScript
 - Adblock
Plugins
 - Flash 9.0
 - Quicktime
Attachment #282476 - Attachment is obsolete: true
Attachment #283497 - Attachment is obsolete: true
Assignee: nobody → nelson
(In reply to comment #10)
> The "briefly describe your
> problem" because the thread title,

The "briefly describe your problem" *becomes* the thread title,
I think this looks very good. We can always tweak it and improve it further (e.g. adding small explanation links to help users figure out what extensions they are running, etc.) but this is certainly good enough!
OK. I have just committed the necessary changes to SVN. Some comments:

1) I have replaced dashes in param and style names with underscores just to avoid confusion because smarty does not like dashes in var names.

2) I have decided to put the "Firefox Version" and "Operating System" in the summary field, instead of the body field. This allows for this information to be shown on the list of forum topics under the name (http://vps2.etazo.net/tiki-view_forum.php?topics_offset=1&forumId=1), and also directly under the topic name in http://vps2.etazo.net/tiki-view_forum_thread.php?comments_parentId=84&forumId=1

You will have to turn on "Show topic summary" in tiki-admin_forums.php?forumId=1, to make it work.
Turning on summaries is good by me. We can do it per-forum, right?

-You forgot to include the plugins in the post.
-Can we get rid of the quicktags?
-Need to format the preview properly
-[Info icon] was actually meant to be an icon. Since we don't have one, I think just drop it.
-Get rid of the "Posting to the forum" box
-Put some whitespace above the forum list when in "Ask" mode.
Do we need the sidebar at all on this page? "Need more help" seems a little redundant considering the user clicked Ask new question.
I suppose we don't, but it may be difficult to get rid of it since it's the same page as the forum list.
Jason, your list of items done. anything else?

and yes, you can turn on summaries per-forum.

By the way, the list of plugins (for me anyway) is very long.

Do we want to use a group plugin or something to limit the viewing of it by certain groups of users?
What do you mean by "group plugin"?

I don't see any reason to limit who can see the list of plugins.
There needs to be some sort of visual separation for the preview. Maybe an hr or a different background color.

I see what you mean about the plugins list being long. I can see two things to change based on http://vps2.etazo.net/tiki-view_forum_thread.php?comments_parentId=115&forumId=1

1. Don't include duplicates
2. Use less whitespace (maybe by making a bullet list?)
Can the plugin/extension list be made expandable, or contained in a div/iframe/whatever with a scrollbar of it's own, with a height of e.g. 5em?

Or what about a link <View Extensions and Plugins> that upon clicked shows all information in a large box in page (again, i guess, using js/css). That way, it's not in the way for people who don't understand or don't care about this info.

I think for most questions, it's not going to be relevant anyway, so displaying it upfront like this on all posts is really going to hurt readability, even if we figure out a way to just display it to registered "helpers."
I don't think you are allowed to have custom js within the content.

However, you can have js in the template that controls a div in the content, of course, through using the DIV plugin.

You can also rewrite the output provided by the searcher to use the hidden content "twister" list syntax of TikiWiki. The following will work (the first plugin has a "minus" after the two "asterisks").

*Plugins
**-Plugin1
**Plugin2
**Plugin3

Jason, can you take back this bug? I want to get working on the others.
The template for the form is templates/styles/mozkb/forum_advanced_post.tpl which is "included" in the templates/styles/mozkb/tiki-view_forum.tpl. The "concatenator" is in forum_advanced_post.php.
Is a twister the thing at http://support.mozilla.com/kb/Windows+Media+Player+-+Information ?
Assignee: nelson → jason_barnabe
yes
Attached patch patchSplinter Review
-Only includes unique plugins
-Puts plugins inside a twisty
-Adds horizontal rules around the preview
Attachment #293059 - Flags: review?(nelson)
Comment on attachment 293059 [details] [diff] [review]
patch

this is in. should use xhtml tag <hr />
Attachment #293059 - Flags: review?(nelson) → review+
Status: NEW → RESOLVED
Closed: 17 years ago
Resolution: --- → FIXED
Status: RESOLVED → VERIFIED
Whiteboard: tiki_feature
Is this related to AAQ?
Whiteboard: tiki_feature → tiki_feature, tiki_depend
Whiteboard: tiki_feature, tiki_depend → sumo_only
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