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Automattic / wp-calypso

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Make it easier to find a command in the command palette #89582

Open dsas opened 4 months ago

dsas commented 4 months ago

Quick summary

Usability testing (paYJgx-4Nn-p2) and feedback from the forums suggests that users find it difficult to use the list of commands after launching the palette.

It appears that some people doing this don't realise that the magnifying glass icon and blinking cursor means they can search, and other people would just rather browse and discover what is available - or perhaps they can't find what they want by searching.

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javierarce commented 3 months ago

I think this one is a bit tricky to solve, because the placeholder clearly indicates that you can search for commands, and it is labeled with the magnifier icon, which we use everywhere there's a search field.

I wonder if the approach we took with the Command Palette (to display the list of commands right away) might have to do with that. Gutenberg uses a different approach, presenting just the search field without any commands. I think this encourages users to type the commands and understand how the feature works. However, it doesn't give you a full picture of all the existing commands, which was the rationale we used to choose the current solution.

Perhaps we could change the placeholder and instead of saying "Search for commands" we could phrase it as a question and say "What do you want to do?". This could encourage some users to type an answer and discover how to use the search field.

dsas commented 3 months ago

🤔 I like that the existing rationale personally - it gives the user an idea of what kind of things are available.

Maybe we could initially display fewer commands so the command list doesn't immediately draw all of the attention immediately.

Maybe we could not display any commands and combine this with your idea about tips - we display a tip saying "type command list to see a full list of commands".