Change Admin Menu Save-State Rules

[janeforshort]

When we redid the menus in 2.7, we built in a save-state to keep open sections you had explicitly expanded until you explicitly closed it. I think it was a good experiment, and in some cases is helpful (like for people who are frequently accessing discussion settings or some such), but overall I think it adds to the problem of having too many menus expanded on a small screen pushing the lower menu items out of reach without scrolling. Mark and I have talked about various options for this, and we both agree that we should remove the save-state feature from the menu. So, the section you're in would stay open and highlighted, and if you opened another menu section to see the subs, if you had another menu open before, it would close. You could only ever have one section open at a time in addition to the one you're currently in. Maybe we could release the original save-state menus controls as a plugin in case there's anyone who prefers it that way.

[johnjamesjacoby]

Since the code is already in the core, could this be a user preference in their profile area?

[johnjamesjacoby]

If I go back in time and remember part of the reason this was switched, was because with <2.5 the complaint was not knowing where plugins added their menus.

You activate a plugin and have no idea where its settings are located (yes even though it should just be settings or its own tab.) So then the only thing left to do is traverse the tabs hoping to find the new entry somewhere.

I think it's deciding which is the lesser of the two evils really, and since the code exists why not turn it into a preference?

[voyagerfan5761]

I second the user-preference option. The code's there and I've found it to be actually very useful. I generally work with the same four or so menu sections, so it's nice to have them always the way I left them.

If people really want to turn it off and it's implemented as a preference, I think it would be better to have upgrading installations have the default as "on" (to keep the current behavior so people don't wonder why something radically changed) and new installations to "off". Otherwise it could be "on" for both upgrades and new installs.

That said, if there's really a lot of pressure to remove this, then a plugin would be nice.

And that's enough from me for now. :)

[Denis-de-Bernardy]

+1

[nacin]

Related: #10646, preventing menus from expanding via JS after page load.

[nacin]

Looks like we missed the boat on consensus and implementation here.

[bentrem]

If this is still open for discussion ...
Replying to janeforshort:

... I think it adds to the problem of having too many menus expanded on a small screen pushing the lower menu items out of reach without scrolling. ... if you had another menu open before, it would close.

In my experience there are 2 variants: one allows user to open as many as s/he wants, other never has more than one accordion open.
This could be the choice?

[celloexpressions]

This is no longer relevant to the way the admin menu works as of I believe 3.3. The logic described here does sound similar to what we have now, can't find the ticket though.