symphonycms/symphony-2 — Issue #905: 2.3 UI: Navigation
Author: eKoeS
Created: 2011-11-20 12:56:59+00:00
State: open
Labels: ux-ui

## Before you post

### Deadline
This issue must be marked as solved before **November 30, 2011**

### Contributing

1. Create a repo called `.github.com`. Your repo will be accessible by the following URL: `http://.github.com/`
2. Import all the files listed in this repo: https://github.com/nilshoerrmann/symphony-styles
3. Make your changes
4. Push your changes to your own repo and notify all the partecipants to this discussion, along with a **detailed explanation** of what has changed and why.

## Open questions

1. Fully dark/light navigation or light-on-dark/dark-on-light?

## Proposals

### 1. Light dropdowns on light navigation (by @nilshoerrmann)

http://projekte.nilshoerrmann.de/symphony-styles/symphony.htm

@nils-werner:

> To me, the bright menu simply doesn't do it. Even with short menus it is kind of tricky to make out the menu from the content table or even the background. It is possible, but not immediately visible: http://www.phoque.de/workspace/uploads/bilder/Bright.png.

> Now if the menu grows in length the issue becomes much more troublesome: In the worst case the lines of the content table lign up perfectly with the menu items, almost camouflaging them completely. Again, you can read them, but it takes quite an effort mentally and visually. http://www.phoque.de/workspace/uploads/bilder/Brightlong.png

> Also, I believe there is a common scenario where people are searching the right submenu item by switching between main menu items quickly. It would be pretty hard to do as you're not only scanning for a line of text but always looking for the subtle hint that assures you've found the correct box in the first place.

### 2. Dark dropdowns on light navitation (by @nils-werner)

http://www.phoque.de/workspace/uploads/bilder/Dark.png

@nils-werner:

> If the menu was visually disconnected from the content by a high-contrast box, those issues are solved almost immediately. You don't have to make sure your eyes stay inside the menu box, the contrast does that for you. You can always be sure you never switch reading-context by accident.

> The same holds if the menu grows in size, everything stays perfectly readable and instantly recogniseable: http://www.phoque.de/workspace/uploads/bilder/Darklong.png

@nilshoerrmann:

> When styling the drop downs we have to make sure they are anchored at the right place. Just locking at contrasts, using dark drop downs makes the second menu level belong to the title bar and not the navigation bar itself. That's a big problem in my eyes and it's the main point why I think the dark drop down are a mess in the current context. [...] I think we should either go with a light navigation or a dark navigation – and that applies to the main and the sub menu.