Icon keywords

[aresvallis]

Title:
Icon keywords

Area:
Icons

Summary:
The icon keywords are an old and outdated system, it'd be easier for users if a better management system was put in place, especially for high numbers of icons.

Description:
Icon keywords really need to be updated. It is difficult and cumbersome managing keywords for icons especially when having a high number of icons. The current system has literally not changed much since 2001. It would be nice having a sort of keyword managing place, one where you could assign icons (and drag and drop would be awesome there!) or rename or merge keywords as you can for entry tags. Additionally, keeping a list of keywords that you've used but don't currently have an icon assigned would be helpful and useful to roleplayers. Even if it's just a static list would let the user see what they've used. As denise said here:
http://dw-biz.dreamwidth.org/7186.html?thread=773394#cmt773394
it might be computationally expensive getting a retroactive list from old comments, I'd suggest not doing that though and just adding a old keyword if someone actively views a comment with an old keyword- it would be looking for that icon anyway and it'd just display the default when it doesn't find it, though I'm not familiar with how the process works exactly.

Poll #9952 Icon keywords

Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 53

View Respondents

This suggestion:

View Answers

Should be implemented as-is.
12 (22.6%)

Should be implemented with changes. (please comment)
9 (17.0%)

Shouldn't be implemented.
8 (15.1%)

(I have no opinion)
23 (43.4%)

(Other: please comment)
1 (1.9%)

Edit!!!! In order to clarify + additional:

It is extremely awkward managing keywords from the icon page from a little tiny text area box, particularly when having many large sets of keywords on one icon with only commas as a separator. I suggest a separate manage area for a list of icon keywords currently in use, and possibly a list of keywords used in the past for reference and the ability to reassign old keywords to new icons. People do not always remember exactly the way they typed a keyword they don't actually have saved.

We have a management page for entry tags, where we can delete, rename, merge and view what is tagged to a specific entry tag. I am suggesting something similar for keywords- if not their own page, at least a section on the icon upload page where we do not have to deal with the tiny text area and only the text area. I can see being able to select a keyword with a check box and hitting a "Rename" button to be able to rename keywords, or select two keywords via check box and hit a "merge" button, or select some "delete" button. Then possibly an "add new keyword" button. That would make keywords more manageable and I don't think it'd require a lot of work, and we already have a check-and-hit-button to delete icons themselves.

We can only rename keywords, we cannot merge them. I've tried to merge keywords, and it didn't work. There is no obvious option nor way to merge keywords. Trying to rename one into another fails. -This is on Bugzilla and is already on the to-do list, but it's part of the bigger management system, so I thought I should include it.

Renaming keywords is sort of a hit or miss using the text area on the icon page, especially if there are multiple keywords to an icon. You do not know if the rename was successful until you go to check comments made with the old keyword- there is absolutely no confirmation, and it is far too easy to typo and create a horrible Frankenkeyword out of the one you're trying to rename and one of the others. Then it becomes annoying trying to undo that because there is no undo button, either, and you have to figure out what keyword you renamed, fix the innocent keyword, and try to rename the suspect keyword again.

This is the same old tired system that has been in use since LiveJournal's early days: By that, I am implying: surely with new coding and technology we should be able to have a more dynamic, easy to use icon and keyword management option.

Comments

[jumpuphigh]

I'm not having any success envisioning what you are looking for here. We can already rename or merge icon keywords. If I want a new icon for an existing keyword, I can already do that as well using the existing system.

[denise]

If you look at the linked comment thread, the suggestion (as I understand it!) is to, among other things, show people a list of keywords that they previously used for icons (in comments or entries) that are not attached to comments right now, and make it easy for them to reassign those keywords. I think the OP also would like to change the keyword management system so it's more like the tag management system -- less "just type in keywords on the editicons page", more "show lists and provide more details about keyword use".

[jumpuphigh]

Thanks.

Completely unrelated, is the new (Hide 1 Comment) option from tonight's code push?

[aresvallis]

1. No, we can only rename keywords, we cannot merge them. I've tried to merge keywords, and it didn't work. There is no obvious option nor way to merge keywords. Trying to rename one into another fails.

2. Renaming keywords is sort of a hit or miss using the text area on the icon page, especially if there are multiple keywords to an icon. You do not know if the rename was successful until you go to check comments made with the old keyword- there is absolutely no confirmation, and it is far too easy to typo and create a horrible Frankenkeyword out of the one you're trying to rename and one of the others. Then it becomes annoying trying to undo that because there is no undo button, either, and you have to figure out what keyword you renamed, fix the innocent keyword, and try to rename the suspect keyword again.

3. It is extremely awkward managing keywords from the icon page from a little tiny text area box, particularly when having many large sets of keywords on one icon with only commas as a separator. I suggest a separate manage area for a list of icon keywords currently in use, and possibly a list of keywords used in the past for reference and the ability to reassign old keywords to new icons. People do not always remember exactly the way they typed a keyword they don't actually have saved.

4. We have a management page for entry tags, where we can delete, rename, merge and view what is tagged to a specific entry tag. I am suggesting something similar for keywords- if not their own page, at least a section on the icon upload page where we do not have to deal with the tiny text area. I can see being able to select a keyword with a check box and hitting a "Rename" button to be able to rename keywords, or select two keywords via check box and hit a "merge" button, or select some "delete" button. Then possibly an "add new keyword" button. That would make keywords more manageable, and we already have a check-and-hit-button to delete icons themselves.

5. This is the same old tired system that has been in use since LiveJournal's early days. Surely with new coding and technology we should be able to have a more dynamic, easy to use icon and keyword management option.

[jumpuphigh]

You are right. Merging isn't currently possible. I thought there was a bug in bugzilla for that though.

[erik]

I see. What threw me off was misunderstanding your first sentence:
"The icon keywords are an old and outdated system, it'd be easier for users if a better management system was put in place, especially for high numbers of icons."

I took that to mean you were looking to completely replace the keyword system with something else; a different way of managing icons. I now understand that you are looking to replace the keyword management system with something a little less like a command line and more like drag-n-drop?

[erik]

I agree; I'm not really getting what you're getting at here.

The age of the keyword system is a straw man. You could apply the same logic to the cut tag, or any number of other features. Or you could take the same premise ("The current system has literally not changed much since 2001.") and arrive at the opposite conclusion, IE: The keyword system is robust and well-tested; we should keep it as it is.

[aresvallis]

See my reply above.

[pocketmouse]

I have no need for this myself, but I'd probably go for it if we ever got a new sorting system for icons (such that I'd actually want multiple keywords for my icons, like if we could sort by subsets).

[erik]

What you're saying seems to imply applying the same keyword to multiple icons, which the system doesn't let you do.

[pocketmouse]

I know. I'm saying 'if there are plans somewhere in the long term future to do X thing, then I vote yes for the above suggestion.' because I'm not going through all of Bugzilla to look that up.

[aresvallis]

We can already have multiple keywords for icons, you just have to separate them by commas.

But if I understand you correctly on the subsets:

You mean having something like Charactername: fuzzy face and Charactername: derp face? With Charactername being the top set and "fuzzyface" or "derp" being the subset? That's an idea, but you could just make keywords like that and it'd show up in the dropdown window on the comment area.

[pocketmouse]

There have been suggestions before of dividing the icon list up somehow, so you don't have to scroll through all 200 icons at once. I don't remember what the outcome of any of those discussions were, but I'm saying I could see the above suggestion being useful if we did have icons broken out somehow.

[blue_rampion]

I'm not quite sure if this fits in with what you're thinking here, but what I would love to see is a way of categorising icons. A lot of people will already try to organise their keywords by starting them off with the name of the fandom the icon is from, or the kind of emotion displayed in the case of rp icons. If part of this could allow specifying groups of icons under user-set categories, that would be seriously awesome.

I do also really like the idea of being able to see old keywords! I'm always having to take screenshots of my icons before I start switching them up, just in case I want to use that keyword later.

[aresvallis]

omg Mr Flibble!

Yeah, someone suggested subsets for keywords, and I pointed that method of keywording. I wouldn't mind an alternative to organizing icons, really, but we do kind of have a "sort by keyword" option. I'd like to see that expounded on actually.

[blue_rampion]

Mr. Flibble's very cross...

The sort by keyword option is pretty awesome, and I do love it so :P But it's not always the ideal method for categorising / making subsets, since it uses up limited characters (I've had a few keywords I've had to battle to cut down as a result). Also, sometimes you might want multiple levels of categories - like say, a category for a fandom, then a category for a character within that, etc etc. That you definitely can't do with the keywording system, because it just gets complicated and messy.

[ninetydegrees]

My w/ changes: I think I'm in favor of a more powerful and flexible UI but I wouldn't like it to be detrimental to those of us who don't have a lot of icons and/or a lot of keywords (by choice or because of their account type) because I believe the current interface works fine so as long as this keeps all kind of usage in mind, yes.

[turlough]

+1

[instantramen]

+1

[susanreads]

+1

[lorax]

+1

[silverflight8]

This is kind of an unspecific suggestion, but I agree. I have only 8 icons and this works well for me.

[cesy]

+1

[shameless2shoes]

+1

[mokie]

Criminitly, yes. I'd love to be able to manage keywords in something similar to the way we manage tags.

I can pull up tags, see that I've got a few single-use tags and see if that's because of a misspelling, because I forgot I already had a tag for that or because I thought I'd be using that tag a whole lot more than I actually did. I can correct that, to keep my system efficient and tidy.

I have a keyword system now, but a few years back, it was all chaos and clutter, so it'd be nice to fix that in one nice Manage panel rather than two or three years of journal entries.