First, I know we’re not ready to start our big sidebar
overhaul yet. But I had some thoughts this morning and wanted to
jot them down somewhere quickly before I forget to mention
them…
I’m looking at the beta front end when I write this, so
anything I mention should be taken in that context.
“Related topics”
The current sidebar basically treats everything as “Related
topics,” which isn’t really accurate. On a page within the
reference for an interface, this space is dominated by links to
other members of that interface. That stuff should be separated out
into its own box, styled like the TOC above.
Then a separate “Related topics” box should be below that,
listing out anything that’s in the “see these pages that might
also be helpful” category. This box would be left out if it would
be empty.
User conveniences
I think each of the boxes in the sidebar should be able to be
collapsed down to just a button that you can then click again to
re-open the box. This lets you minimize any that you don’t want
to see at the moment. Ideally you’d also be able to rearrange
them, but that’s for a distant future.