Here are the results from user 7 (in our menus user testing series) & user 8 both with the 23119.17.diff patch applied.
User #7
Step 1: Log in
No issues.
Step 2: Go to menus
No issues.
Step 3: Add a menu
No issues.
Step 4: Add pages to menu
No issues.
Step 5: Reorganize pages
No issues.
Step 6: Set as primary menu
3:20 – She noticed the new link in the yellow confirmation after saving changes to her menu that said, “replace your sites main navigation”, however after clicking it, she thought she had completed the task.
Step 7: Add another menu
No issues.
Step 8: Add links
No issues.
Step 9: Add custom menu widget
No issues.
User #8
Step 1: Log in
No issues.
Step 2: Go to menus
No issues.
Step 3: Add a menu
No issues.
Step 4: Add pages to menu
No issues.
Step 5: Reorganize pages
No issues.
Step 6: Set as primary menu
No issues.
Step 7: Add another menu
No issues.
Step 8: Add links
No issues.
Step 9: Add custom menu widget
No issues.
Observations/Thoughts
- Smooth sailing for the first user. This is the fastest completion time that we’ve seen so far (at 8:02). The only thing she missed was saving the “Main menu” as the “primary menu” in her theme. I think this was more than likely due to my poor instructions, than anything else. Anything else we can do there?
- The second user also breezed through the menu tasks.
- I’m stoked about the progress we’ve made here.
Thoughts?
lessbloat, 
Joey Kudish 8:20 pm on January 11, 2013 Permalink
Sweet! this is looking good!
Drew Jaynes (DrewAPicture) 8:23 pm on January 11, 2013 Permalink
User testing is so awesome. Maybe we should get more general with the link in the updated notice. “Manage your site’s menus” or something.
Drew Jaynes (DrewAPicture) 8:31 pm on January 11, 2013 Permalink
After watching #7, maybe change it to:
Main Menu has been updated. Assign a theme location for this menu, or use it in a widget.
It also occurs to me maybe we should have a “Manage your widget menus” link somewhere on or around the theme location metabox. Thoughts?
lessbloat 8:35 pm on January 11, 2013 Permalink
Copy change: Nice. I like it.
Widget menus link: Not sure, I think I’d have to see it.
Jerry Bates (JerrySarcastic) 9:22 pm on January 11, 2013 Permalink
I notice that User 7 did not correctly set the Custom Menu Widget to the Sites I Love menu. She left it set to Main Menu, which is filled by default instead… Maybe it would be better to have the Widget show a list with checkboxes (of the available menus) with none of them checked by default? Seems like an easy way to avoid that mistake.
Perhaps if the Custom Menu widget was similar to the Categories metabox on the Add Menu screen? I.E. has a list with checkboxes for the menus, plus tabs at top for Recent, View All, and Search. That would add some parity between creating a menu, and configuring the Custom Menu widget.
lessbloat 4:02 pm on January 21, 2013 Permalink
These are all good thoughts. Let’s make sure we address them when we tackle the widgets page UX.
kristofferR 9:25 pm on January 15, 2013 Permalink
User 7 got confused at task 7, around 3:30, and did not manage to actually set the menu titled “Main menu” as the primary menu of the site. Some part of the issue may simply be because the name of the menu was confusing (“Main” and “Primary” are synonyms after all, no wonder she though the Main menu was the Primary menu), but I also think it was because the “Manage Menus” screen doesn’t provide adequate instructions like the other screens does.
While the user previously was guided through the process of creating a menu with clear instructions positioned roughly the same place on the screen (top of main box on the right), after clicking the “replace your sites main navigation” link she was redirected to another page where other elements, mainly the table list of the available menus, are much more noticeable than the action she actually wants to take, which is setting the primary menu. The user shouldn’t have
There could be solved in a few different ways.
1. Add a sentence or two of explaining text in a yellow box
2. Make the “Menus within your theme” box larger and more noticeable
3. Grey out the table until a primary menu is set if the user came from clicking the “replace your sites main navigation” link.
I think a combination of 1 and 3 would be best. Here’s a really quick mockup of what something like that could look like: http://molakki.com/files/wp-menu-1.png
As a side note not really related to the menu UI changes we’re talking about here directly, but still seen in the user testing videos is how confusing the experience of saving widgets are. The user receives no feedback at all that the widget has been saved except for a spinning circle for half a second. It should instead be similar to how the experience is saving new changes in the customizer, like this:
http://molakki.com/files/saving-widgets.mp4
lessbloat 4:04 pm on January 21, 2013 Permalink
RE: Main menu – I’d like to try and move that to “Screen Options” and see what comes of it.
RE: Widgets: – I agree, when we tackle widgets, let’s make sure we address this.