Inconsistent terminology on menus panel

[frankieandshadow]

If you add a link to a menu using the "Links" box, it shows up in the menu contents alongside as "Custom". So when I said to my client "just add a new Custom menu entry" they didn't know what I was talking about. Please can you change "Custom" to "Link", or something which uses the same word(s) in both places. Didn't this used to say "Custom Links"?

[frankieandshadow]

screenshot

[DrewAPicture]

Good catch. Yes, I believe it was previously called "Custom Links" prior to 3.6. I was never really a fan of just boiling it down to "Links", I much prefer what it was before.

[tyxla]

I totally agree with you guys. IMHO, Custom Link (singular) and Custom Links (plural) makes most sense to me. Neither Custom nor Link(s) seem clear enough for users that don't have much WordPress experience.

Attaching a patch for that.

[tyxla]

Changing Links and Custom to Custom Link(s) in administration nav menu interface.

[SergeyBiryukov]

Replying to DrewAPicture:

Good catch. Yes, I believe it was previously called "Custom Links" prior to 3.6.

Right, see comment:217:ticket:23119. The argument was that "Custom Links" doesn't convey any action, so it was changed to "Add Links", but the "Add" prefix was removed later for consistency with other accordion boxes.

(Other boxes initially got the prefix as well during the work on #23119, but it was removed later for i18n reasons.)

[helen]

In 31748:

Nav menus: Return to calling links "Custom Links".

It was like this before 3.6 and got a bit lost during that development cycle. Also uses the terminology more consistently in the nav menu UI.

props tyxla.
fixes #31344.

[designsimply]

Neither Custom nor Link(s) seem clear enough for users that don't have much WordPress experience.

Based on testing I've done so far, the longer label "Custom Links" is still a little confusing. Maybe it's just links in general that are confusing to people who are not experienced with editing content for the web and that will always be the case for some regardless of the shorter "Links" label versus the longer "Custom Links" one. In the tests, users seem to find their way quickly enough but surprisingly sometimes open "Custom Links" and then just skip right over it.

Here is a short highlight reel of clips so far: ​5m39s
^{(Note: there are clearly visible bugs in the first few clips which have been fixed now, some of these tests are from earlier feature development)}

From the original description of the problem:

So when I said to my client "just add a new Custom menu entry" they didn't know what I was talking about.

This makes total sense if the label was actually "Links" and you told them to add a "Custom" entry. :) What you described sounds like a problem with the instruction, not with the UI. Had you instructed someone to add a link, I don't think they would have had any trouble.

Anyway, I don't think keeping something the same label as it was in the past is necessarily a good argument for forgoing change. I like the idea of continuously working to find the clearest, simplest solution, and sometimes that turns out to be different from the status quo. I don't feel strongly enough about this particular label to ask to change it back (yet), so that's why I'm just adding some thoughts here. What I can say is that so far in testing, I never saw the "Links" label come up as a blocker for anyone. If this comes up again in the future or if it persists as a point of confusion in user testing, I will open a separate ticket.

Cheers, and thanks frankieandshadow and tyxla for adding feedback/patches and for being a part of WordPress. :)

[frankieandshadow]

It wasn't what was called that was the problem, but that it was called two different things in different places.

[designsimply]

I see. I don't know the history of why links are named "Custom" in the menus admin page. My guess is that people have trouble with links in general (regardless of the "Custom" label), which is what is starting to show up in tests.