In reviewing the first 6 user tests, one thing really stands out to me (it’s a glaring problem in each of the tests). Can you guess what it is?
It might not be what you’d expect…
It’s actually the effort required to simply locate whatever section you’re trying to find (to get stuff done) – ask a new user to do ANYTHING, and they have to hunt and peck around the admin UI for 2 minutes before they can even get started (and they have to do this for every single task!). Over 60% of the users time was spent just trying to find the area they needed to get to. That sucks!
In my mind, this is a massive problem. I’d say hands down, it’s our biggest usability stumbling block at the moment, and I’d like to see if we can figure out a way to fix it…
C0BALT, 
Brent Logan 6:23 pm on July 11, 2012 Permalink
And good luck reorganizing the menu structure without upsetting everyone who is used the way it is… :-/
lessbloat 4:07 pm on July 12, 2012 Permalink
Haha. Ya, I’m not positive that we’ll need to go there.
Shane 8:44 pm on July 11, 2012 Permalink
I wonder how much of the time spent searching was on high traffic vs low traffic activities. Having to search to figure out how to set my time zone might be acceptable. After all, how often do I really change it. Having to search to create a new piece of content, which I do regularly would be indeed a total fail.
lessbloat 4:12 pm on July 12, 2012 Permalink
That’s a good point Shane. I agree, some actions should take precedent over others.
Andrea Rennick 12:28 pm on July 12, 2012 Permalink
What if there was a teeny tiny help section that a user could search to find what they needed?
If I’m in a program and can’t find a menu item, I head for the Help -> Search areas.
Ipstenu (Mika Epstein) 3:22 pm on July 12, 2012 Permalink
Oh that would be a nice thing. Do enough people poke at Contextual Help to make that a good place? Maybe the tool bar could have a ‘search’ that flipped to backend when on admin pages?
Amy Hendrix (sabreuse) 9:01 pm on July 12, 2012 Permalink
I don’t think I’ve ever seen a user notice the help tab until it’s pointed out to them. Visible search in the admin might be more visible…
JerrySarcastic 11:07 pm on July 14, 2012 Permalink
I have to agree, the help tab is strangely invisible to most new (and even advanced) users I run in to. Perhaps finding a way to add the search tool within the help tab will get more eyeballs on it. Seems logical to have it there, since the functions can be so closely related.
lessbloat 4:15 pm on July 12, 2012 Permalink
I like this idea a lot.
I’d love to give users the option of A) browsing, or B) quickly searching.
Amy Hendrix (sabreuse) 8:58 pm on July 12, 2012 Permalink
Sadly, that’s exactly what I expected – because I end up hunting around for things myself an embarrassing amount of the time.
Luke 9:35 pm on July 12, 2012 Permalink
I like the search idea a lot. I could almost see it becoming a bit like launching applications from spotlight in Mac OS. Start typing “post” and you could get immediate feedback about what section of WordPress are available for that search term. Spotlight is one of the fastest ways around Mac OS. A similar feature in the WordPress admin area could be quite accessible for new users and incredibly useful for power users.
lessbloat 11:43 am on July 13, 2012 Permalink
Mel Choyce 4:34 pm on July 15, 2012 Permalink
Definitely a +1 for spotlight-style searching. It would be really useful.
Vitor Carvalho 10:58 pm on July 14, 2012 Permalink
Why not simply implement something like Ubuntu HUD? A global ajax search bar for all the admin tasks.
http://youtu.be/w_WW-DHqR3c
Cyndy Otty 10:30 am on July 17, 2012 Permalink
Mika Epstein sent me over here after I posted this in the ideas section. All of which is probably still valid for 3.5, which makes me want to cry a bit.
But yes, the reordering and/or moving menu has been an issue I’ve brought up for several versions. If it’s difficult for those of you with sight, imagine how maddening it is for those of us playing hunt-and-peck with a screen reader. (And the fly-out menu thing does not help!)
As a heads up we’re expecting our second… « Lessbloat 11:45 pm on July 23, 2012 Permalink
[...] that users can come back to again and again to find anything they need in the admin. As I mentioned here, this was a big stumbling block for each of the users we [...]
C0BALT 7:44 pm on July 26, 2012 Permalink
I think a huge plus would be the ability to re-organize the post or page editing page, especially for people who have had wordpress setup for them.
Think of it like this.
Currently, people fill in the title, then start typing. This is obviously very simple, but falls apart when the person has finished typing and hits publish.
There needs to be a “must fill in these things” option, and the ability to re-organize the order things get filled in… to match the training that you’ve already left with them.
1: Select Category (this is most important so it shows up in the right place)
2: Type or select Tags
3: Type fill out custom fields / taxonomies
4: upload image(s)
5: Type Title
6: modify URL title (optional)
7: enter content
etc. Plus removal of other fields on the page which are not used
Click publish…
You say this is already all there. I say, it’s not in the right order and it’s all scattered all over the page.
I would want those 7 things listed in order from top to bottom and when you hit “test” or “publish” it tells you, everything is valid OR something needs to be filled out still, and that thing that isn’t filled out turns red.
There is so much extraneous information (and un-ordered) on post / page pages it is extremely difficult for new people to wordpress to figure this out.