Introduce Left-Hand Navigation Menu Headers and Zones

[crdunst]

First time posting, please be kind :) I've been meaning to drop by with some feedback for a while. Feel free to move, reword, split out or delete this ticket if the format is wrong.

I'm primarily a developer, but with a background in UI design. I've been building with WP for 8 years, and work with client sites day-to-day when they're loaded with plugins, rather than 'vanilla' installs.

The plugin architecture is great, but numerous plugins can mean numerous left menu options for site-owners, interspersed with post type links. This can quickly get out-of-hand, and overwhelming for end-users.

Of course every plugin author thinks that their plugin warrants prominence. I'm looking at you SEO and Analytics plugins.

Menu Zones:

1) Have 'zones' of menus with headers, all on the left menu, based on function. So a heading of Content with post type links underneath (pages, posts, plus custom post types).

Then Settings with 'Tools', 'Plugins', 'Settings' etc underneath.

Lastly, a Plugins header where SEO plugin authors, slider authors and such can drop their links.

To be clear, this is simply introducing headers between the left-menu links.

2) Restrict or Guide placement in the correct zone.

Theme developers should be able to place left-menu links in any category. They know their theme best.

It's difficult to programatically restrict plugin authors to 'zones', but establishing the convention is a start. The plugin approval process might choose to reject an SEO plugin for placing their link in the 'Content' zone, but allow an Events plugin to place a link there.

Bonus: Top Navigation

Don't allow plugin authors to place links in the top nav (again, SEO and Analytics plugins are the biggest culprits). This just breaks the concept of everything on the left, and the left-to-right direction of 'select, edit, publish'.

The top menu can easily become overwhelmed given the text is horizontal.

[knutsp]

Hello @crdunst

Welcome to Trac and thanks for the ticket and suggestion.

Related: #47012

[crdunst]

Related: #47012

Some fantastic suggestions in there.

My quick suggestion feels like I've brought some supermarket cupcakes to the Great British Bake Off :)

I'll (try) to close my ticket, it looks like the issue is in hand.

[knutsp]

Duplicate of #47012.

[chaion07]

I think having a few mock-ups or visualization can definitely help with design feedback and the UX/UI aspect of things. Thank you!