3.5 About page

[nacin]

Update about.php for 3.5. This ​IRC conversation still needs to be summarized, but mentions a number of things:

• Media, including the new dialog, the new editor of attachment pages, ImageMagick (better image quality if your server supports it)
• new oEmbed providers
• HiDPI admin
• plugin favorites
• smoother/lighter experience (like removing options and cruft, TinyMCE looking sharp, button styles, etc.)
• continued improved accessibility
• color picker?

Under the hood:

• meta query for WP_User_Query and WP_Comment_Query (I think those are both 3.5?)
• multisite changes — specifically performance (switch_to_blog()) and caching sanity. subdirectory and ms-files are both for new networks, but could get a mention in some form depending on how we write it.
• WP_Post is a good thing to mention, but primarily for performance reasons, so maybe not in name.
• XML-RPC API additions (revisions, user management)
• new and updated libraries (backbone, underscore, jq/jqui, tinymce)
• maybe PHP 5.4 sanity?

johnbillion and lessbloat will be leading the charge here. Ideally, this is all done (in first draft form) by next week.

[rmccue]

Replying to nacin:

• new and updated libraries (backbone, underscore, jq/jqui, tinymce)

+ SimplePie 1.3 (1.3.2, in fact, when I release it next week).

[lessbloat]

22455.diff​ is a rough first draft for the layout and screenshots.

A few notes:

• Suggestions welcome (layout and image selection). Happy to work on this until it's just right.
• I made the images extra large to start - we can size then down from here.

Here's a ​retina screenshot of what it looks like.

And a ​scaled down version (though it's a lot more rasterized).

[miqrogroove]

Next to "HiDPI Admin" you've got two screenshots: One of them is not an admin screen. The other is the admin menu, which hasn't changed noticeably since 3.4.

How about making a couple nice screenshots of the new post editor?

Give Twenty Twelve its own heading on this screen. Offer some tips on how to make it look better than a black-on-white layout with no shapes or colors in it. What I mean by that is, you've got a photo of the ocean in the screenshot, but that's not how it's going to look on a fresh install. It just says Hello world! with no photo.

[nacin]

That is a badass first attempt. Nice!

To address miqrogroove's ideas: Twenty Twelve does indeed a section. Also, the new TinyMCE icons could probably fit right into a smoother experience.

Let's try to whip up some content over the next day or so. If we ship RC by the end of the weekend, maybe we can have an initial about.php in trunk by then. (It's great to point people there in pre-release announcement post, as it gets them antsy to install it, and then it basically tells them where to poke around.)

[lessbloat]

In 22455.2.diff:

• Added twenty twelve section
• Added different HiDEF image
• Added TinyMCE icons to smoother experience section
• Optimized the images a bit more.

[johnbillion]

First text draft

[johnbillion]

22455.text.diff​ is the first draft for the text on the 3.5 About screen. If you grab lessbloat's images in 22455.2.zip​ you can apply the patch and see where we're at.

[nacin]

Excellent start! This is much further along than I expected.

If I read through it, I'm sure I'll have a lot of specific feedback, but I'll hold onto that for now until koopersmith and I can dig into and it and really go through it.

Removing i18n-change as that only gets used once we hit string freeze, which will be sometime after RC1.

[johnbillion]

Just noticed that the heading text ("Thank you for updating...") is also shown on the Credits and Freedoms screens. It'll need updating there too in due course.

[DrewAPicture]

Text tweaks

[DrewAPicture]

22455.text.2.diff​ tweaks:

• Fixed SoundCloud and SlideShare casings
• Lowercased 'Theme' in Twenty Twelve theme
• Simplified the first sentence under Accessibility (too many evers)

Two other suggestions that came to mind:

1. Maybe emphasize multiple galleries in the 'Picturesque galleries' section
2. Mention Iris (incoming) and Farbastic (outgoing) in the External Libraries section.

[lessbloat]

Updated second accessibility screenshot to show new gray background

[lessbloat]

Made a few copy tweaks in 22455.3.diff:

• Shortened copy for first three items (under Media Management)
• oxford comma's

[nacin]

In 22814:

About page for WordPress 3.5, first pass. Not yet offered for translation. props lessbloat, johnbillion. see #22455.

[nacin]

What we really need to do now is a full review of this, particularly where emphasis should lie and how we should communicate it. After Thanksgiving I will look, and I am going to ask a few members of the core team to weigh in as well.

Tasks:

• Synchronize the main string with credits.php and freedoms.php.
• Retina screenshots (see #21805).
• Offer strings for translation once the text is finalized.
• RTL (and IE?).

[duck_]

about-tinymce.png needs to be remade without "Upload/Insert", see [22828].

[helenyhou]

Replying to duck_:

about-tinymce.png needs to be remade without "Upload/Insert", see [22828].

Also so that the split button arrow doesn't have the white background.

Could we get about-color-picker.png without the focus outline on the slider? Yay accessibility, but I don't think it needs to be in that screenshot.

P.S. I'm tickled that my plugin favorites and terrible rating habits are currently immortalized. :)

[SergeyBiryukov]

Updated about-tinymce.png​ and about-color-picker.png​ (both smushed).

[PotterSys]

Fixing a little typo on "Attachment page editor"

[PotterSys]

I know text on this page is a draft, but there is a typo in the "Attachment page editor" section (a question mark right after «You can crop, rotate and resize images right in the Media Library»)

[ryan]

In 22856:

Rather than question ourselves, exclaim!

Props PotterSys
see #22455

[jane]

@nacin pinged me in Skype and asked me to look over/nitpick on the About screen.

Media Management

• There is a mixture of title case and headline case for section headers. We should do all title case.
• "than ever" is used in the intro line *and* in the first promo under Easier Interface, and sounds repetitive. Cut one. Specifically, cut the one under Easier Interface, because "Adding media to your posts is more streamlined than ever" implies adding media was streamlined before, which we all know is a bald-faced lie. :)
• Ditto "easier" on the repetitive word use thing. Picturesque galleries also uses "easier." Saying everything is easier is kind of lazy. What makes it easier? One specific example of what makes it easier is more convincing than the "trust us, it is, go try it" implied by just repeating easier. (As writing teachers like to say, show, don't tell.)
• Easier Interface and Picturesque galleries (cap G for title case) both start with "Adding," and sounds repetitive. Change the galleries one to Creating.

Smoother Experience

• "WordPress always aims to stay out of the way, and let you get on with publishing your content." 1. No comma. 2. "get on with" implies we caused an interruption. Substitute "focus on" so it does sound like we're keeping out of the way.
• The subheading (Simplified settings, better buttons, easier controls) and one of the sentences (You'll find simplified settings screens, more aesthetically pleasing buttons, and easier controls such as the improved color picker.) are too similar. Make the sentence more specific instead (like the color picker mention is good, but doesn't need the "easier controls such as" part) to remove the repetition.
• Settings screens are mentioned twice, but the first screenshot is the post editor. I assume this is to show off the borderless buttons. The things is, now they don't look like "buttons," so anyone who doesn't instantly recognize that there used to be button outlines (I would guess this is a lot of people) will wonder what they're supposed to be noticing. An actual settings screen would be better here.

Twenty Twelve Theme

• "Make the design of your site fully yours with a custom menu, custom header image, and custom background color or image." This sentence is not specific to Twenty Twelve, so should be replaced with something that is. This is the first time we've done something that is as great for a website as for a blog. Pimp the home page template, not core features that have been around for a long time.
• In the screenshot, make a quick sample site with Twenty Twelve instead of using the theme demo site screenshot. See the screenshots we've done in the past -- basically make a fake blog with realistic page names and something that is clearly the fake site title and tagline (vs the theme name and tagline, and page names like "Sample Page," "Full Width," etc). Also put in fake promo content, not an excerpt from a real literary work. The image is pretty, and one I assume was taken by Matt or someone on the theme team, so we have the right to use it? (Does anyone else instantly thing of a pharmaceutical commercial?)

Better Accessibility

• No hyphen in mouseless.

More Embed Support

• Putting someone else's logo into your product can be a violation of their trademark. Make sure we have clearance from Instagram, SlideShare, and SoundCloud.

[Ipstenu]

First Pass for Jane

[Ipstenu]

I gave a shot at some of the changes Jane suggested. I didn't do the screenshots, but I kicked around the wording (and grammar). Attached 22455.jane1.diff​ as a first past at Jane's suggestions.

[nacin]

Thanks Jane, that is great. I am also looking for a higher level review of this screen. My take:

• The screen should focus on three main things: media, media, media.

• "Attachment page editor" is more of a hidden improvement. "Media" should focus squarely on the new media dialog/workflow.

• Under "Smoother experience," at most, the new color picker should be displayed. As Jane pointed out, the TinyMCE buttons are subtle, and people are going to notice the button styles as part of a light UI refresh. They're UI elements, not features.

• Twenty Twelve and Retina are both more important than the smoother experience. I'd say media, the theme, and retina are the top 3 things of this release.

• The "Better Accessibility" is a bit weird, and the screenshots are not very helpful. They apply to relatively few users. Also, it's kind of a "Wait, WordPress wasn't already accessible?" issue. It's also one of those behind-the-scenes niceties. I think a sentence talking about more device support (mobile!) and better accessibility could work well under the smoother experience section, sans screenshots.

• "More Embed support" should be a single item under media, media, media. See 3.3's screen for when we added new file formats. I think Twitter in 3.4 was an exception, not the rule. Also, I don't like the idea (legal reasons, as Jane points out, aside) of three third-party for-profit company logos taking such prominence in an open source application.

• Plugin favorites is a fairly hidden feature. If we do a cycle that enables you to connect your WordPress.org account and suddenly review, rate, and favorite plugins from your dashboard, then it's a huge feature. Until then, we should give this somewhat less prominence. (Not sure what to pair it up with, though.) I also think this is one of the rare instances of it being a good idea to cap check the about page with install_plugins. No need to show this to regular users or multisite non-super admins.

• Leaving a note before I forget, the meta query section should also mention NOT EXISTS queries.

This is basically my morning, so I'm going to be working through this.

[jane]

I agree with Nacin's comments.

[kirasong]

If we still want to include an example of how images can look better with Imagick, I found a good way to consistently create an image that looks significantly better (after being manipulated with Imagick vs. GD).

First, take any image that has more color information than SRGB (RAW/CR2, for instance), and export/develop to ProPhoto JPEG.

Then, do a resize (or any operation) with WordPress using Imagick and GD. You'll note that the GD one will end up in RGB with a distinctly green tint, and the one with Imagick will retain the color profile and look as it should.

If it's helpful, I can grab a couple of examples from personal shots and post them here. If you've got a RAW or ProPhoto file(s) in mind already, post it here, and I can toss it through the GD/Imagick blender.

[johnbillion]

We can't make IM too prominant on the About page because it only affects servers which have it installed. It would confuse people who think their images will look better without realising it's dependant on their server having the correct libraries installed. It's sufficient to leave it in the technical notes at the bottom.

[nacin]

I am picturing a before-after split screenshot, diagonally, with the top left triangle being better than the bottom right, and it being obvious that top left is "after" while bottom right is "before", probably from the shading of the line cutting them in half.

Then, we'd say "we produce better images if your server supports it," and can even check WP_Image_Editor_Imagick::test() to tell them if they do (and to suggest they talk to their hosting company if they don't).

[johnbillion]

Replying to nacin:

• Under "Smoother experience," at most, the new color picker should be displayed. As Jane pointed out, the TinyMCE buttons are subtle, and people are going to notice the button styles as part of a light UI refresh. They're UI elements, not features.

I agree that three images here is overkill, but it's difficult to convey the various subtle changes across the admin interface in one screenshot. If we just have a screenshot of a new color picker it looks like we're scraping the barrel for features to list.

Maybe we should cut the 'Smoother experience' section out entirely and let the About screen do its work promoting the bigger new features?

• Twenty Twelve and Retina are both more important than the smoother experience. I'd say media, the theme, and retina are the top 3 things of this release.
• The "Better Accessibility" is a bit weird, and the screenshots are not very helpful. They apply to relatively few users.

I disagree. The retina admin affects a tiny proportion of the user base. We should promote the fact that WordPress is working hard to continually improve accessibility. I'd hate for it to appear that WordPress favours catering for people with $2,000 retina MacBook Pros but gives lower priority (or prominence) to accessibility.

Also, it's kind of a "Wait, WordPress wasn't already accessible?" issue.

Well that's correct to an extent. That's why the accessibility improvements have been made. They're listed as improvements, not as "WordPress is now accessible".

• "More Embed support" should be a single item under media, media, media. See 3.3's screen for when we added new file formats. I think Twitter in 3.4 was an exception, not the rule.

I agree. In my first text draft I used this section to promote the embed functionality as a whole, not just the three new providers. Maybe the About screen isn't the place to do that.

• Plugin favorites is a fairly hidden feature. {snip} we should give this somewhat less prominence.

If we're going to have an admin pointer on the Add New Plugin screen pointing to the Favorites tab then I agree, this doesn't need as much prominence on the About page.

[SergeyBiryukov]

Replying to johnbillion:

If we're going to have an admin pointer on the Add New Plugin screen pointing to the Favorites tab then I agree, this doesn't need as much prominence on the About page.

The favorites pointer was removed in [22874].

[nacin]

New patch. Here's an outline:

• New Media Manager
  • Beautiful Interface
  • Picturesque Galleries
  • Insert Multiple Images
• New Default Theme
  • Introducing Twenty Twelve
• Retina Ready
  • So Sharp You Can’t See the Pixels
• Smoother Experience
  • Better Accessibility
  • More Polish
• Under the Hood
  • Meta Query Additions
  • Multisite Improvements
  • Post Objects
  • XML-RPC API
  • Image Editing API
  • External Libraries

[nacin]

Here's a screenshot: about.png​.

helenyhou is tweaking some styling.

lessbloat is working on new screenshots based on these guidelines:

• Media: Just needs to be updated to trunk. Probably with the icons from #22610 applied.
• Retina: No changes needed.
• Color Picker: Slightly more blue selected color (to match the text). Or, it'd be a cool egg if we went with our current WP blue (#21759b). Also, the screenshot should avoid having the dotted focus outline style on the slider.
• Twenty Twelve: I'd agree with Jane's suggestions above.

[helenyhou]

22455.5.css.diff​ does some style tweaks, notably for the images (need some more breathing room for the drop shadow) and adding a responsive breakpoint. Depending on where we land, there's probably a lot of CSS we can cut out entirely, e.g. anything that deals with two 1/3 images side by side.

22455.5.diff​ is a complete patch, including a markup change to under the hood to make it two rows of three columns for better alignment.

[lessbloat]

Replying to nacin:

lessbloat is working on new screenshots based on these guidelines:

• Media: Just needs to be updated to trunk. Probably with the icons from #22610 applied.

Done in 22455-images-omptimized.zip​. I tried capturing it with one file still uploading. Not sure if that works.

• Color Picker: Slightly more blue selected color (to match the text). Or, it'd be a cool egg if we went with our current WP blue (#21759b). Also, the screenshot should avoid having the dotted focus outline style on the slider.

Done in 22455-images-omptimized.zip​ (used #21759b)

• Twenty Twelve: I'd agree with Jane's suggestions above.

I played around with this for a bit, and couldn't come up with anything that looked better than what's there now. If anyone wants to play with this on, please feel free.

[lessbloat]

Version of media screenshot without "uploading file"

[nacin]

In 22903:

Reorganize and polish the About WordPress 3.5 screen. Offer strings for translation.

props lessbloat, helenyhou, markjaquith, nacin.
fixes #22455.

[johnbillion]

Nitpick: The Retina Ready section should say "high-DPI" not "high-resolution".

[lessbloat]

Removes old Upload/Insert link from screenshot.

[DrewAPicture]

Probably going to need a refresh on the media screenshot due to the new tab from #21776.

[nacin]

Let's hold off on trying to take a screenshot until RC3 is out.

[lessbloat]

about-media.2.png is update to about-media.png after final UI changes.

[nacin]

In 23010:

Updated media screenshot for the about page. props lessbloat. fixes #22455.

[DrewAPicture]

This is kind of a nit, but if you look on the QuickPress widget in the Retina screenshot, it was taken when the old Upload/Insert text was still there. Shall we leave it?

[nacin]

In 23019:

About page: Update retina screenshot to remove the old Upload/Insert icon from QuickPress. props lessbloat. see #22455.

[JerrySarcastic]

about-hidef.png​ catches a few more nits, in case it's not too late...

• Removed "Links" tab from the dashboard nav
• Changes version to WordPress 3.5
• Changes active theme to Twenty Twelve (for karma points)

[JerrySarcastic]

about-hidef.2.png​ also removes the old Upload/Insert icon from QuickPress, which I mistakenly reintroduced. Good to go...

[nacin]

Note that the current one also has the "Search Engines Discouraged" line removed, and already has 3.5 as its version. This is a better starting point: ​http://core.trac.wordpress.org/browser/trunk/wp-admin/images/screenshots/about-retina.png?rev=23019. Looks like all that would need to be changed is Links removed and the theme switched to Twenty Twelve.

If troublesome (not sure if you are photoshopping this), I think lessbloat can handle it on Wednesday.

[lessbloat]

about-retina.2.png is an update of about-retina.png with:

• links menu removed
• Part of toolbar showing to frame the image better
• WordPress 3.5
• Twenty Twelve
• Discourage search engines removed
• Upload/Insert removed

And it has been ImageOptim'd.

[nacin]

In 23022:

Update the 'Retina Ready' screenshot on the about page to reflect version 3.5, Twenty Twelve, and such. It's the little things. props lessbloat. fixes #22455.

[pavelevap]

Media manager screenshot is outdated, see changes in #22753.

[lessbloat]

about-media.3.png is an update to about-media.png. I pulled the search and filter bar to show an additional row of images. :-)

[helenyhou]

I like.

[lessbloat]

Removes "Switch to RTL" ;-) (note: this has been imageoptim'd)

[dfavor]

Please update this ticket as to whether there will be an RC4 or testing should be done from tree.

Also, correct way to pull from tree by tag (as in 3.5 for example).

Thanks.

[merty]

Replying to dfavor:

Please update this ticket as to whether there will be an RC4 or testing should be done from tree.

RC4 is already (silently) out.

[dfavor]

Figure Silent-RC4 was out.

What's to correct way to pull from the source tree via a 3.5 tag, to test Silent-RC4?

Thanks.

[helenyhou]

You should be testing against trunk, and the better place for this question (which is wholly unrelated to the ticket) would be the ​support forums.

[dfavor]

So just use ​http://wordpress.org/download/svn/ trunk pull.

Thanks.

[JerrySarcastic]

In about-media.4.png​ is it too nit-picky to say that that in the Attachment Details we may want to display a more common image size, like 600 x 400, not 6000 x 4000? Not everyone can upload images of that size, depending on server settings, though we kind of imply that in this screenshot

Again, shoot me if that's stupid...

[merty]

It doesn't look natural to me either. A more down-to-earth resolution would make it look more like a "screenshot from a daily use". Maybe that's just me.

BTW, will Credits tab see a refresh?

[nacin]

Replying to merty:

It doesn't look natural to me either. A more down-to-earth resolution would make it look more like a "screenshot from a daily use". Maybe that's just me.

I like it. People are used to managing photos, not screenshots. Unless you're using a floppy disk camera that's a decade and a half old, your photos are gonna be much bigger than 600 x 400.

BTW, will Credits tab see a refresh?

Yes.

[nacin]

In 23109:

Final screenshot on the about page for the media manager.

props lessbloat.
props matt for the photos.

fixes #22455.

[nacin]

In 23126:

Remove 'Insert Multiple Images' from the about page as it is now completely invisible in the UI. Requiring shift-click but not mentioning it is a bad omen. props helenyhou. fixes #22455.