[RFC|Accepted] Cleaning up the ACP UI

[ameeck]

One thing we came up in NY. It would be great to see what settings in the ACP are actually used. We could get some interesting data from the statistical information that is being sent from individual boards.

By removing settings that are not used (left to default and not changed), we can clean up many of the ACP pages, especially under the General tab. Removing excess ones will allow us to make the other ones more apparent and ease navigation over the configuration pages.

[ameeck]

By going through the ACP, there are some settings we could remove without any harm or anyone noticing anyway, e.g.:

Attachment settings

• Secure downloads - white/blacklist attachment downloads, includes Secure download, empty refferer, and allow/deny list settings
• Unify post/PM attachment max size setting, just use one
• Attachment display order
• Unify post/PM max attachment count, just use one

Board features

• Merge enabling of topic/forum subscription or just delete it
• Merge enabling of PM/posts attachments
• Allow disabling of word censor

Avatar

• Minimum avatar settings
• Avatar gallery path

PMs

• Change per-folder limit of PMs to a global limit of all PMs you can have at one time
• Allow print view in private messaging .... WTF??!

Post settings

• 50% of the options are duplicates from Board features - no reason to have them at both places

E-mail settings

• E-mail function name

Many more are in question, but these are the most apparent.

[nickvergessen]

Post settings

• 50% of the options are duplicates from Board features - no reason to have them at both places

I'd remove them from the board settings...

[Jhong]

Also, why is "authentication" under "client communication"? Shouldn't it be under "server configuration"?

[hanakin]

I agree that the acp needs some cleaning. I am all for the custom general based on the most-recently used aspects of the acp.

One other thing that could maybe be simplified is the styling interface, from a theme development standpoint having to clear each aspect individually is a pain when making changes to a theme. Not to mention having to go to the general tab as well to clear the cache. possibly adding a link to the side menu that would clear everything for the currently active theme as well as clearing the cache.

[Oleg]

I. General tab

1. Quick access

A. Spiders/bots

This is not something to which frequent access is needed. Suggestion – Move to Users and groups tab under Users.

Yes.

B. Moderator log

Why does one need quick access to the Moderator log? And why single it out? Why not include the Admin log? This is another duplicate control. Suggestion – delete it.

I think I agree here. Most boards would not be constantly monitoring their moderators.

C. PHP information

Why does one need “Quick” access to this? People check PHP information daily? Weekly? I think not. Suggestion – keep on System tab and delete from here.

Yes. I'm pretty sure "System" is a natural place for this. New users should not have trouble figuring this out.

E. Client communication

Mass E-mails should be moved from System (huh?) to here.

Yes. Probably. System can't be the right place for mass email regardless.

Need to think more about the other items.

Also, why is "authentication" under "client communication"? Shouldn't it be under "server configuration"?

Yes. Probably. The current location of it can't be right regardless.

3. User security – If these are security settings, they should all go to (ahem) “Security settings”. And Prune users is a security setting, how? It should be moved up under Manage users, all of which would have the effect or removing this category.

I propose renaming "user security" to "banning" and moving "prune users" to below "inactive users" under "manage users".

[Oleg]

While trying to test the 3.1 announcements, I had to use the acp. The result is the following tickets all relating to user permissions:

http://tracker.phpbb.com/browse/PHPBB3-10129 (missing apostrophes)
http://tracker.phpbb.com/browse/PHPBB3-10130 (unclear language)
http://tracker.phpbb.com/browse/PHPBB3-10131 (wrong back link)
http://tracker.phpbb.com/browse/PHPBB3-10132 (add link to view permissions to edit permissions page)
http://tracker.phpbb.com/browse/PHPBB3-10133 (make trace permissions more visible)
http://tracker.phpbb.com/browse/PHPBB3-10135 (edit permissions from trace permissions)

[Oleg]

I was looking through acp module management module trying to add the attachments management module. It was not obvious how to add a module; I thought the list included all modules whereas the not installed modules are in a dropdown.

I propose adding an "Add module" heading above the add module dropdown.

If we keep "create new module" form it should be below "add module" form.

Speaking of which, what is the purpose of "create new module" form? Am I right that in normal use there is already (supposed to be) a module for all code present in the board, and therefore creating new modules is pointless?

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Adding a module produced the following confirmation text:

Are you sure you want to add the selected module with the selected mode?

There is nothing related to any mode in the module addition form. What is the mode being referred to here?

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Why do I need to add and then separately enable the module? What is the distinction between not added and not enabled modules? Can enablement be part of addition, say, by adding a check box "enable module" into the add module form which is turned on by default?

[Oleg]

Should we maybe move "Resynchronise or reset statistics" out of acp's front page? It cannot be a frequently needed block at all. A link to it in its place ought to be sufficient.

[Oleg]

Testing https://github.com/phpbb/phpbb3/pull/163 I was looking through various registration settings.

Turning off captcha is in "user registration" group, turning off mx record checking is in "security settings". I knew that security settings is a dumping ground for such settings, if I did not know that it may have taken me a while to find the right group (through exhaustive search, basically).

Admin activation

Searching for something like "acitvation" to find where I activate new users produced nothing useful. I gave up and went to the acp index where I saw this:

Inactive users

This is a list of the last 10 registered users who have inactive accounts. A full list is available from the appropriate menu item or by following the link below from where you can activate, delete or remind (by sending an e-mail) these users if you wish.

Clearly the "appropriate" in my view of it menu item does not exist, so at least I would have appreciated being given a direct link. Now I basically need to repeat the entire search but this time looking for "inactive" users instead of "activating" users, which eventually landed me on "inactive users" page.

I think some sort of improvement is necessary to make it more obvious where to activate users. Even if technically they are equal to deactivated users (whatever that means) conceptually those are different things.

And if "inactive" means "not activated" then why not call that group "Activate users"?

Somewhat related to this, how about renaming "maintenance" to "maintenance and logs"? Would you guess where the logs are by reading tab titles only?