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Who do I have to pay to be able to "pin" the "Board Switcher" to the left hand side of my Trello — as used to be standard in the previous version of Trello?
I can finally pin the board. Hooray! Except...the lovely, useful feature of being able to have it pinned on the left but still collapse it from view is no longer an option. I have lots of clients, with a unique board for each, and also other boards for my own workspace. Before, I could collapse the list of all my other clients while the screen was shared, then if I needed to grab something from a Workspace board - unshare, click, copy, reshare. Now, my work flow is really annoyingly impeded. Everything is multiple extra clicks, and a lot more time where I have to stop screen sharing, which is awkward down time when they're paying by the hour...
Please, for the love of Pete, just bring back the old system for those of us who found its directness and user-friendliness the whole point. The more fussy and finnicky and icon-based and "in the know" the system gets, the more I'm inclined to move elsewhere.
And what a relief, along with it comes the ability to reorder starred boards in that list (and thus effect the keyboard short-cut)
One niggle - (kind of similar to what Megan is saying) is the collapse/reveal keyboard shortcut only half works.
- if the board switcher is CLOSED (docked or otherwise) then pressing the keyboard shortcut 'b' to reveal the board switcher works as expected
- if the board switcher is OPEN (WHILST DOCKED) then pressing the keyboard 'b' moves focus to the "search your boards" dialogue box, which intuitively feels wrong, shouldn't this be a toggle on/off?*
- if the board switcher is OPEN (WHILST UNDOCKED) then the "search your boards" dialogue box is already focused, which in this context makes sense, simply clicking away from the UNDOCKED board switcher closes it
*It kinda makes sense you want to shift focus to the dialogue box, but I would argue that the keyboard short-cut should over-ride the auto focus to the dialogue box, ESPECIALLY whilst the board switcher is docked... A user can make their own choice at to whether to click in the "search your boards" field, rather than have it forced on them (and thus losing that ability to 'toggle' the board switcher off again) - as others have also implied this is introducing unnecessary friction into our workflows.
It's only a small issue in this implementation, which on the whole makes a hell of a difference to the UX - but in the spirit of kaizen these small incremental changes do have a far reaching impact.
It does surprise me that these UX friction issues weren't picked up during alpha though?
One other point on this Beta release, which chimes again with Megan (and others) - there's still too many clicks to action some features that were hitherto more readily available in the previous iteration - hidden a level deeper within the UI.
I understand that sometimes these things take time to 're-learn' but - when features introduced (like card automation buttons, for example) that were one click-away before, are now hidden an extra step away below abstract icons on a little floating island below your card (therefore making it very easily missable) - This firstly adds friction and secondly, by removing the buttons from the card itself and having them on an 'island' below the card means they're no longer 'card buttons' - (using your automation rules nomenclature) - they're completely isolated and disconnected from it and as a consequence become disassociated from that card losing that psychological intuitive connection.
It's a subtle shift I know but it does make a difference to how we (as end users) navigate an interface.
It strikes me that the floating island 'tool-box' is the source of many a frustration.
I could get used to it, (especially if the icons are permanently labelled, as is now evident with this latest iteration at board view level) but I don't think it serves the purpose for which it's intended. It takes up valuable board real estate and I feel clutters the screen and feels a bit like an afterthought.
If it must be floating then perhaps the ability to drag it to somewhere else would be useful, better still, the ability to dock it elsewhere would be perfect.
Thanks for continuous updates. In my mind it is improving and I'm a fan of the changes on the whole, but I have to say it does feel a little more like an alpha.
Further to my points above regarding the tool island.
The most obvious solution is to implement a 'tool ribbon' style solution - that is synonymous with a myriad of other UI's - and placing it at the top of the outer container, adjacent to the Trello 'home' icon - reading from left to right, granting the importance of the feature uppermost on the screen where one would expect to find it.
(Not hidden at the bottom)
There's plenty of negative space to use, reducing the width of the search field and perhaps offsetting it to the right - and placing the trello, inbox, planner, board & switcher toggles on the top left.
All the top level tools are within a short mouse movement away from one another whilst solving the real estate/cluttered board issue and re-introducing an establish UI gestalt.
Why re-invent the wheel?
eg.
I'm pretty sure that this would be a universally accepted solution.
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