[wp-design] Minor Tweak

[Khaled Abou Alfa]

Okay this is all really good, this is what I was hoping for to be 
honest. I've been throwing things trying to see what will stick. The 
reason is I can really feel how between us we've really worked this 
design around. Here's a short recap of where we've been in terms of the 
header and the tabs:

















Lot's of variations. I can see your ideology behind the fact that there 
is several types of buttons to click. I'm still not convinced 100% of 
the dark blue on the bottom, although I think it works better than just 
having them was shown in the
above examples (i.e grey text and blue link). I agree there has to be a 
better way, and maybe the macromedia way might be a sensible method, and 
maybe the tabbed way could be further explored.

One thing that you've got to say about the tabbed system however is that 
visually it's uninspiring. Something about the single line gives it a 
bit more of a polish. I've tried to make the tabs work (see the curved 
version) but aesthetically speaking here it really
doesn't fly for me.

With regards to the buttons, yes again you've got a point, but those 
particular functions are specific and we've chosen to highlight them in 
a different way (we didn't put them in the main navigation for example) 
and that gives them an elevated status. Maybe they should be more 
connected with the WP brand, however like I said before throwing things 
to see what sticks. Those buttons might not be the way forward, but it's 
a jumping on point.

With respect to the body, I'm still not 100% on the stylings of it all. 
Michael mentioned this before and it's basically feels a little less 
polished than the rest of the design.

And here I was ready to tackle another area of the design, thanks a lot 
Joen :). Now we're back to arguing again :). Chris, Joshua, Ryan, Matt, 
give us feedback here boyos.

Joen, good points, thanks for that, I'll have a look into the various 
options, just to see where we can go from there :).

K


Joen Asmussen wrote:

> I really like how all the main content looks, with write, collapse, 
> etc, but I have to be honest and state that I don't really like the 
> whole new header. I'll be specific, it's only fair.
>
> The blue colour is a good colour to brand Wordpress with, it has all 
> the right qualities.
>
> But i'm not seeing a strong brand in any of the other elements. 
> Basically, we have several stylistic approaches in one. There's 
> gradients, glass effects, inset shadows, rounded buttons, frames, 
> square buttons, highlighted buttons.
>
> The problem with this is: "which style is the identity", and "where do 
> I click". If it's a blue hyperlink, or a gray push button, it's a no 
> brainer. But with no less than 3 new visual click styles, I'm just not 
> getting it.
>
> *The Tabs*
> It's not that we should go back to blue hyperlinks and push buttons. 
> It is only this: When something is clickable, there should be NO doubt 
> it's clickable. And THAT, is one of the main reasons why I've been 
> voting for tabs all along.
>
> Tabs have the magnificent ability to be instantly recognizable, yet 
> able to hold several levels of information without taking up space. 
> Heck, Adobe patented it, so it must be good.
>
> *The Identity*
> Visually, the problem is that several stylistic approaches to 
> providing the Wordpress identity waters out the brand.
>
> As it stands now, with the simple CURRENT wp logo (not the one on 
> these mockups), and the mainly monochrome colours, Wordpress sort of 
> communicates core values such as "simplicity". It doesn't do it as 
> well as it could do, and it MIGHT lack some elegance.
>
> And hey, my own previous glassy mockups are suffering from these same 
> visual problems, so I'm guilty as charged, but that's why we do these 
> mockups.
>
> But this new direction, to me, communicates confusion and complexity. 
> The elegance is lost in the confusion. Additionally, I must agree with 
> Michael that it works well with the logo. To me, the logo communicates 
> wicked worn rather than wicked elegant. The solution to having the 
> logo work, to me, would be to show the entire logo, and perhaps in a 
> different colour.
>
> *Concrete feedback*
> So the above was a rant because I felt it was necessary. Here are some 
> bulletted items of advice (I might get some time to mock with it myself):
>
> * The navigation.
> Oh damn why won't you go with tabs. But seriously, there's got to be a 
> better way. Maybe the first line of navigation is a line, while the 
> second one is tabs, kinda like how Wordpress does now? (or like 
> www.macromedia.com does)
> Maybe make the navigation a vertical sidebar tab like the OSX one?
>
> * The style
> This is hard. I'm not really seeing a strong theme in the style. What 
> could help could be to approach the "log out / view site" links 
> differently. The glass from the wp logo doesn't seem like the glass on 
> the main line of navigation... maybe if they were more the same ?
>
> Well, we've come a long way. But as an old chinese saying goes:
>
> "The moment where you are the closest to giving up, is when you are 
> closest to succeeding."
>
> So we're really getting there... but IMHO we have to really nail these 
> last things!
>
> J
>

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