Freshrss: Improving multiple views UX

[marienfressinaud]

There were historically 3 views in FRSS:

• normal view, with the list of folded/unfolded articles, is pretty well appreciated besides some feedback
  
  
  
  • the feed name appears in blue, it is expected to redirect to the website itself
  
  
  • when articles are folded, it might be expected that a new window opens, the "accordion" behaviour is confusing
  
  
• global view could be considered as useless since we already can have a global view of categories on the left of the screen in normal view. The interface that opens when clicking on the name of a category or a feed is absolutely not expected by users
• reader view is confusing because we can already "read" in normal view and we can doubt of its real interest

I've honestly never be fan of the two last views and never used them. I would suggest to drop their support and stay with the normal view only but it can be debated of course.

Speaking of useless buttons, I would say that the sort button is very not used, and the import/export button next to the "Subscriptions management" button is absolutely not useful (it would be better to have a "add feed" button). I can open separate issues about these two specific problems (?)

[lapineige]

I've honestly never be fan of the two last views and never used them. I would suggest to drop their support and stay with the normal view only but it can be debated of course.

For the reader view: maybe add an option to always unfold all articles on normal view ?
Or improve it with extra feature that would add some extra interest in this view ? (for instance, article duration, extra styling, …)

[Frenzie]

I only ever use the regular view, but I do use sort.

Is the accordeon confusing? It seems pretty useful to me. :)

[lapineige]

Is the accordeon confusing? It seems pretty useful to me. :)

Same for me, another window would be annoying (especially on mobile devices).
Couldn't the UI suggest how to use it ?

[Alkarex]

I mostly use the regular view, but I do use the read view quite often (a button to toggle open/close all articles at once from the normal view would be just as good for me). I never use the global view (but my wife does, although she rarely use FreshRSS).

[lapineige]

For my part I always use regular view, I never used the global view, and I only use the read view from time to time on my phone (on my PC, I open the article in Firefox reader mode, I've more control on the look&feel).

[GLLM]

I use Freshrss daily and only use the normal view, all articles folded and I unfold only the article I'm currently reading.

I would not care to loose the other views.

[aledeg]

@marienfressinaud I like the reader view even though it might be misnamed. I follow a lot of picture feeds and this view is perfect for that since I can see pictures without delays (lazy loading).
If we're casting a vote, I'd like to keep that one.
If we have a way in the regular view to mimic that view, that's fine (See @Alkarex comment https://github.com/FreshRSS/FreshRSS/issues/2017#issuecomment-420056483)

What would be very nice is to have different behaviors in different folders. My 2¢

[Frenzie]

I hadn't even thought of that. Reader view + old to new sorting might be useful on some feeds.

[Alkarex]

We could easily have a custom view per feed (simply requires adding an option to the existing feed config page and take advantage of the existing database JSON field)

[aledeg]

I was thinking a bit more how I use the interface and what changes would be nice according to them.
I wish we could have lazy loading activated per feed/category.
I wish we could have a thumbnail view like pinterest to see all pictures in one glance (even if I hate pinterest :face_with_thermometer: )

[squromiv]

I used RSSOwl, QuiteRSS, Tiny Tiny RSS (self-hosted) as feed-aggregators and readers. And now I try to work with FreshRSS. In all mentioned programs, with the exception of FreshRSS, there is great 3-pane view mode. For example, in RSSOwl it looks in the following way:

Classic three-pane view

Widescreen three-pane view

It is very usefull and comfortable feature, specially if it is used with "readability" tool. In self-hosted TT-RSS it is implemented also in standard settings. And now I can't imagine working with similar applications without it.

I have found out, that extention "threepanesview" for FreshRSS exists, but it does not function on my system for unknown reasons.
And in spite of this, i think, that this great option should be included in FreshRSS directly. Please, consider this possibility. Thanks for attention.

[nicofrand]

Hi there,

really digging up this topic, sorry about that, but I only just noticed my extension threepanesview was quoted and not working.
Could you elaborate @squromiv? Maybe there is something I can improve…