UX: Contextual toolbars

[oleq]

Does CKEditor 5 need contextual toolbars?

• When buttons should disappear? In which situations?
  • Cases:
    • simple context change (like paragraph -> table),
    • editable change (see: UX: Sharing toolbar between editables #100).
• When buttons shouldn’t disappear? Are disappearing buttons confusing?
  • Should there be an indicator in the toolbar which would identify the context (state) of the toolbar (like "editing table at the moment")?

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"Default" context toolbar

Specific context toolbar

[fredck]

There is a good chance that the contextual toolbar will, if ever implemented, add more items on top of the default set on most of the "special content" cases like the one exemplified (e.g. text inside list). A reduction may be seem on "object" selections, like images or tables.

[scofalik]

I think that contextual set of UX elements works best on floating toolbar (be it anchored to caret position or to selected element, like image or table cell). I think that hiding part of UI items is bad in stuck toolbar. Maybe usable ("new") contextual UX items could be show in an extra tab (auto-selected), that would otherwise be not available.

[oleq]

@scofalik Something like "In–toolbar editing (super–contextual toolbar)" in #97?

[scofalik]

Yes, I've seen them only after I commented here.
Which maybe is a point that the idea is good :P

[SteveTheTechie]

You could also add a contextual tab containing special toolbar items like MS Word does with its "ribbon". I tend to think end users will want some consistency in the UI, so having a lot of disappearing and appearing toolbar items in a frequently used toolbar could lead to confusion. You need at least one "main" toolbar to be consistent and familiar.

[wimleers]

+1 for what @scofalik wrote. A fixed toolbar with many disabled buttons is confusing/overwhelming/ugly.

But @SteveTheTechie of course makes a good point too.

[oleq]

@SteveTheTechie Something like "In–toolbar editing (super–contextual toolbar)" in #97?

[SteveTheTechie]

@SteveTheTechie Something like "In–toolbar editing (super–contextual toolbar)" in #97?

Yes... you could do something like that.

[Reinmar]

I posted some ideas about contextual toolbars in #98 (comment).

[Reinmar]

Cleaning up old discussions. See #186.