Developers of Sympa

["address@concealed" <address@concealed>]

Hi developpers,

Here is a brief review of how to find existing lists in sympa. I think
it is not that easy for whom doesn't know precisely what she is looking
for. Please find below issues and proposal to solve them.

Issues
------

To find a list, there are currently different approches offered by the
web interface. User has to make her choice between multiple (sometimes
redundant, sometimes different) items:
- use the search field on the home page
- use the categories list on the home page
- use the index entry in the menu bar
- use the search entry in the menu bar

The categories workflow doesn't work:
- when creating a list, the user has no choice but select "other" when
the list doesn't match one of the few allowed topics (which is frustrating!)
- all topics are given to the user to browse, even when no list exists
(which is very frustrating!)

The list index has some caveats too:
- all the lists are shawn on the same single page
- that page can take some time to load in case there are a lot of lists
- always the same list are shown at the top, while the user may want to
discover some new stuff from time to time

Proposal
--------

Group index, search and filter features on a single page, so that user
doesn't have to worry where to go to find what she is looking for.
Provide user with useful sorting methods. Avoid overloading the index by
limiting the number of items by page.

You'll find experimental wires[0] on my git repository[1].

[0]:
https://git.framasoft.org/mjourdan/sympa-design/raw/d9781bafd96fafb3b10b5b4a390688c3af72175c/search-wires.png
[1]: https://git.framasoft.org/mjourdan/sympa-design/

Would be happy to read your thoughts.

--
Mathieu