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Manual Sorting of Favourites
Page Overview
[Hide]1 Initial Problem
The list of favourites is a personal tool for accessing the most important objects of a user in ILIAS. These objects can currently only be sorted by type, location or alphabet. The most obvious sorting option is not supported - manual sorting by the user.
2 Conceptual Summary
The ViewControl Sortation is extended by an option "Sorted manually". This is followed by an Ordering Table in which all object entries are displayed and can be ordered accordingly. Saving the ordering leads back to the dashboard or to the screen the user was on when the ordering is called up from the Favourites slate.
The ordering of objects follows the chosen values.
No clear result has yet been achieved for the implementation of sorting in a modal or in a separate screen. See the comment in the "Discussion" section.
3 User Interface Modifications
3.1 List of Affected Views
- Dashboard Panel "Favourites"
- Main Menu Slate "Favourites"
- Modal "Manual Sorting of Favourites"
- Administration » Dashboard
3.2 User Interface Details
3.2.1 Dashboard Panel "Favourites" and Main Menu Slate "Favourites"
Extended Option in ViewControl Sortation
Ordering Table to order the objects in "Favourites" 
Option "Ordering in Modal"
3.2.2 Administration » Dashboard
At the sub-tab "Sortation" from the Dashboard Administration, the Option "Sort manually" is added to "Favourites". When picked, the Administrator can choose, if new objects are added defaultly at the top or the bottom of the object list.
3.3 New User Interface Concepts
No new UI component introduced.
4 Technical Information
Killing, Alexander [alex], 7 June 2023: I am currently unsure if this is to be considered more a dashboard or a favourites feature. There are more blocks that could be sorted manually, like the study programmes. Are these sorting feature implementations become parts of the corresponding components or the dashboard service? The current PR regarding the global settings moves a substantial part of the favourites implementation from the repository service to the dashboard service, e.g. perfoming actions like add/remove from favourites as part of the dashboard panel, see https://github.com/ILIAS-eLearning/ILIAS/pull/4941 . So I am unsure how to proceed with the manual sorting here.
Recent conversations suggest that this topic is located in the dashboard domain.
5 Privacy Information
Current privacy document of repository service: https://github.com/ILIAS-eLearning/ILIAS/blob/trunk/Services/Repository/PRIVACY.md
ILIAS will additionally store the ordering for each user/object in a table containing the ordering number, the user id and the object id.
6 Security Implications
No security implications.
7 Contact
- Author of the Request: Initial Request by Kunkel, Matthias [mkunkel], Lowe, Simon [simon.lowe], Update by Samoila, Oliver [oliver.samoila]
- Maintainer: Szmais, Ingmar [iszmais]
- Implementation of the feature is done by: {The maintainer must add the name of the implementing developer.}
8 Funding
If you are interest in funding this feature, please add your name and institution to this list.
9 Discussion
Killing, Alexander [alex], 4 May 2023: I do not think that this is an obvious mode at all. If you use the feature regularly, you will always have a set of objects that has been added since your last sorting operation. These objects woul need to be presented on top or on the bottom of the list, both is distracting imo.
Seiler, Yvonne [yvseiler], 15 May 2023: When I add something new to a favorites list, I would expect the new thing to always appear in the first place (on top of favorites).
I still have problems understanding how to trigger and save this process:
1. under Dashboard will there thus be the entry "Manual Sort" AND "Configure" or just "Configure"
2. on the Configure screen, the previous sorts are in the Actions menu on the top right. Is there still something that you have to select "Manual Sort" to get the numberings?
3. at the Configure-Screen how would the change be saved (f.e. Save Sorting-actions)?
Samoila, Oliver [oliver.samoila], 15 May 2023:
The dashboard displays are currently being revised in three requests. This request is related to (A) Global Dashboard Settings of Presentation and Sortation for all Dashboard Sections and (B) KS-ViewControls for Dashboard Sections.
(A) affects all other sections on the dashboard as well as the favourites on the dashboard. There are changes in the area "Remove multiple objects" or what can be reached from the slate via "Configure". The request should therefore start from the new and changed status. See DevIssues in Discussion-Chapter.
From (B) the question is how to deal with the ViewControl Sortation when manual sorting is selected. "Manually sorted" could/should be a sort option in my opinion. Then it must be clarified from where the screen is called in which the order is specified.
The option "Sorting Manually" would have to be maintained in the administration and it would have to be decided whether this should only be possible for favourites or for all sections on the dashboard.
The proposal should please show the corresponding screens and workflows.
JourFixe, ILIAS [jourfixe], 15 MAY 2023: Due to the scheduled changes for ILIAS 9 (see [[https://docu.ilias.de/goto_docu_wiki_wpage_7503_1357.html]] we need to update the FR and discuss it again on an upcoming JF.
Lowe, Simon [simon.lowe], 06 JUN 2023: I updated this FR in order to follow the scheduled changes for ILIAS 9. As result of the discussion with Oliver, the manual sorting could be nice to have for other Dashboard sections too. Therefore I added the FR Manual Sorting of My Courses and Groups, which is pretty the same, but I wanted to split this up.
Killing, Alexander [alex], 7 June 2023: I added a comment under "Technical Information" since I am not sure about the "boundaries" of the services here.
Seiler, Yvonne [yvseiler], 21 JUL 2023: I support the need and the goal of this request. In the UI Clinic (see minutes part 1 and minutes part 2), it was supposed that the FR Global Dashboard Settings of Presentation and Sortation for all Dashboard Sections could be a useful analogy with the use of a modal. However, there are still open questions regarding the use of a modal. I therefore recommend checking as an alternative whether in this case it would be more helpful for users to get on a separate screen with a table (as recommended here for manage screens).
Lowe, Simon [simon.lowe], 24 JUL 2023: After speaking to Samoila, Oliver [oliver.samoila] and Seiler, Yvonne [yvseiler] I added a few more information to this FR.
In general we would like to implement this feature for alle dashboard sections, so we ask the JourFixe to accept the implementation of manual sorting for all dashboard sections at the same time (for ILIAS 9). As next step, we would adopt this feature to all other dashboard sections and provide corresponding feature requests.
In addition it has to be discussed, wether this feature belongs to the dashboard or to the favourites (see comment of maintainer at section 4).
JourFixe, ILIAS [jourfixe], 24 JUL 2023 : We highly appreciate this suggestion and would like to have a manual ordering of favourites on the Dashboard. Before scheduling the feauture finally we need to decide if we choose a modal or a separate screen with a UI Data Table to manage the ordering of objects. For this issue a dedicated workshop is requested (asap). We consider this feature to be part of the Dashboard service (maintainer information changed).
Samoila, Oliver [oliver.samoila], 05 JUL 2024 : A lot has happened in the area of UI components since the last JourFixe decision. With the Ordering Table, we have a new option for ordering entries.
In discussions with Seiler, Yvonne [yvseiler] (in Role of UI-/UX-Expert), no clear result has yet been achieved for the implementation of ordering in a modal or in a separate screen. However, we did agree that ordering would have an added value. The quantity structures that have to be ordered in this process are probably the decisive factor. If the decision is successful, we would like to examine which is the better solution. The JourFixe should either leave the decision to us or request that we come back with a clarified goal and a DevIssue.
JourFixe, ILIAS [jourfixe], 08 JUL 2024: We highly appreciate this suggestion and schedule the feature for ILIAS 10. We follow Oliver's suggestion to check which presentation (modal or extra page) is the better solution for this feature.
10 Implementation
{The maintainer has to give a description of the final implementation and add screenshots if possible.}
Test Cases
Test cases completed at {date} by {user}
- {Test case number linked to Testrail} : {test case title}
Approval
Approved at {date} by {user}.
Last edited: 8. Jul 2024, 16:33, Kunkel, Matthias [mkunkel]