(First, if you upgraded from 3.2 to 3.3 and you don't see the change, no need to comment on it further to that regard. The point has been made. If you want to get a look at what's coming in 3.3 do a fresh install so we can focus this thread whether or not the new menu is desirable.)
@Ipstenu, thanks for contributing to my post, I've read a ton of your other posts over the past year and your comments have helped me through countless questions and issues with WordPress. You've been invaluable...
six of one, half a dozen of the other
I don't agree. With the menu in 3.2 we can choose whether we want the minimalist collapsed feature. We won't have a choice in 3.3. So this is a contentious feature change.
there's no way to please everyone on this.
Again, I'm not sure I agree. Who was asking you to remove the expand/collapse feature? Can you point us to that request and the support for it? I disagree with you point again. I'll eat my words if you prove me wrong, but this is a case of designer self-indulgence (albeit fantastic design), without regard for the actual utility of the design choice(s) being made with the menu. In other words, why is the designer "fixing" something that wasn't broken? If these were complaints about the menu before, this isn't going to fix that. And the decision has been made to make this change only so you can "jump out of the frying pan into the fire", then it's a superfluous change, and I believe that goes against WordPress philosophy.
So again,
there's no way to please everyone on this.
I think there is:
at some point down the road, the Feature Pointers in WordPress 3.3 may have an API added on to them so that Plugins can point out new features or point out where the configuration option pages are located right after installation/activation.
Fantastic, I love that this is coming. My suggestion is that you release the new menu simultaneous to API additions, so that both plugin developers and users can prepare, and give users like me the ability to find workarounds to the functionality they're losing and embrace the change.
Not to be dramatic, but WordPress administration with 500+ sites takes up hundreds of hours of my time each month, and the menu change is something I am *passionately* unhappy about.
Newbies are always going to have a problem.
Good point, so the menu change is less important to new users than existing users. Clearly the WP community is huge and still growing, and we all benefit from recruiting new users to WP.
So if I had a vote in planning the releases I would strongly urge that the menu not be changed until navigation and information architecture problems can be solved the "right way", so that new users can find their way around quickly, and to simultaneously release an API which enables third-party functionally so as to not alienate existing users. Especially evangelistic power users with hundreds or thousands of sites, who will be frustrated that the menu system was overhauled WITHOUT even fixing what was wrong with it in the first place.
The menu in 3.2 has all kinds of problems, but primarily related to information architecture and despite having a better appearance, and without the aforementioned API, 3.3 is only going to make those IA problems worse. Releasing the new menu system at the same time as the API is a change I would embrace wholeheartedly, and that is a situation everyone could be happy with.
Until that situation becomes plausible, please reconsider this change. My OCD brain is already counting the minutes I'll lose in productivity every hour, fumbling over a new menu system that doesn't even solve the usability problems that the old on had.
