I like it a lot! Only bug I found so far is the settings page. It shows the workspace settings, but when pressing any page it says “Page not found”.
I agree here as well. I would like to being able to turn it on one space at a time, with an option to toggle all on or off.
One of the big issues I will have is the lack of “New View” button without architect mode on. And with architect mode it shows the databases which will clutter.
I have a “Playground” space which has no databases, and has most the views of the workspace. I do this in order to allow the users to create views as they need, without being architects of the data. It works quite nicely.
With this feature, it will add more confusion to the end users instead of simplify. If they want to make a view, they need to first toggle Architect mode, then turn it off. If they leave it on, it shows the space settings and (the lack of) databases with the option to create a new database. Maybe this architect vs user switcher is something that can be turned on or off per user? Maybe default for admins but not for users? And if a user has Architect access to more than 50% of the spaces, it shows a message “Do you want the architect switcher”? Or something.
If we keep database switcher per space it will be even more complicated. Now you have to turn on architect mode, and then turn on databases in space you need. We will not go for it. Alternative is to remove this architecture mode completely and keep old behavior.
Oh ya, I forgot about this! This is definitely not good design: if user mode is on, some of the settings menus are listed but then clicking on that menu item just brings up the “Page not found” message. User mode should hide any settings menus that aren’t accessible.
But honestly, the architect mode as is doesn’t add any value for me (and even adds some clutter). So I’ll let others speak to this more.
This isn’t what I mean. Imagine the “Show Databases” button becomes a “Architect Mode” button. All entities and views in spaces that have architect mode on become shown with architect controls. Then there’s a global on and off that simply turns all spaces “Architect Mode” on or off. So it’s still a single toggle like now if you want to turn all on or off, but also the ability to turn Architect mode on or off per space.
The global control will only shown to admins who can Architect everywhere.
But this still wouldn’t solve the problem I have with the “Playground” space…
There are the following actors (in my mind):
Fibery Architects (those who’s sole job is maintaining the Fibery workspace, not work in the workspace. Admin/Architect everywhere)
Internal Fibery Champions (those who have a different job, but also run and maintain the Fibery workspace. Admin/Architect everywhere)
Admins for billing/power purposes (those who have no idea how Fibery works, but need to be able to invite users, manage billing, etc. Admin, but not architect)
General users who need to create views of data. (just have architect for the sake of making views and not for database or management.)
This switcher is most useful for nr 2 and nr 3 I think.
Nr 1 and 4 would perfer things as they currently are.
1: Needs to always see the architect controls, and current implementation allows for a cleaner sidebar most of the time
2: Needs to work in the workspace more often, so turning off architecture stuff is helpful
3: Probably shouldnt be touching architecture stuff in the first place.
4: Turning on architect mode just to create/edit views, then turning it off for a cleaner sidebar every time isn’t a nice experience. (explained more in previous post)
Not sure about the best solution. Maybe keep the “New View” even when Architect mode is off? Or even better, allow control for non-Architects to create views. But I think that’s more complex…
I think this switch radically changes the way an architect works in their workspace, and not in a good way. I find the current behaviour to be better and more flexible.
My vision of an “non-admin” mode for admin is the following : removing the power to see everything, keeping the power to do everything. It means that if I’m on User mode :
I shouldn’t be able to see Spaces where I’m not a member.
I shouldn’t be able so see entities that aren’t shared with me.
These points joins what @a2say said on his first post :
I should be able to do everything I can do as an Architect : create Views, Rules, Buttons, etc… Without needing to switch to another mode.
Have you tried making use of the Personal section of the sidebar and adding things (spaces, views, etc.) as Favorites?
We will soon make it possible for Admins to be Architects in a space without necessarily having access to all the entities in the space (unless explicitly shared with them).
I just meant that if you don’t want to see everything, but still want to be able to do anything, then only showing certain spaces in Favorites (and thereby implicitly hiding the rest) gets you part way there.
It doesn’t prevent you from seeing entities you don’t care about, but it keeps you from being distracted by spaces/views you don’t care about.
If I’m not mistaken, I think Jonathan’s point is that non-admin mode is to “see what the user sees”, for the purposes of testing non-admin UX, and not for the regular workflow of the admin him/herself. Using Favorites doesn’t really satisfy this purpose in my mind.
From reading other replies, I think there’s a difference between “Non-admin” for admins, and “Non-architect” for architects.
What was built at the moment is “Non-architect”.
“Non-admin” would mean that that the switcher would give the admin the access to space based on the access that was assigned to them, and not be architect everywhere just because they are admin.
Then an admin could assign themseves access as they need for their work, then turn on non-admin mode. If their work means they need to an architect in a space, they will still be architect even when non-admin mode is on, since they have assigned themselves as architect.
This would not only change UI, but also the entity permissions.
Then the “show databases” behavior could be the same as now. The only difference is if an admin wants to configure a space they are not assigned to as an architect, they must change to Admin Mode, then Show Databases, then make the changes.
This might get a bit confusing though…
And I believe you said you wouldn’t go for it:
Note that this will only be needed for spaces where you didn’t assign yourself as an architect.
From my standpoint, this is a helpful clarification. Initially, I was definitely anticipating the “non-admin” mode, and not the “non-architect” experiment we have now. I still need to play around some more with the new experimental behavior to develop my thoughts more.
It’s an option, I didn’t thinked about adding a Space as Favorite but I prefer to keep the main things on the Workspace section (opened by default when I open Fibery) and specific things I need to focus, on Personal section.
In the point of view of an architect, I think that the personal section is secondary and should not become the main one. I have only Views I want to keep an eye regularly and some personal documents or notes.
If I want to change something on the Space of a View I have in Favorite (and I don’t want to keep the whole Space as Favorite), I will need to go back to the Workspace section.
I think that building my proper Workspace inside my Personal section can be a temporary solution but I’m not sure that’s the right direction in the long term.
For me this is another feature. And I would like to have it one day on Fibery : be able to see the same as a selected User sees. On Salesforce for example, you can “login as…” and see what another User see. This is very useful for debugging.
I’ve turned the experimental feature off now. I found that I was too frequently switching between architect and non-architect modes. The declutter from removing certain UI elements was overpowered by the clutter of showing all databases for me. I much prefer being able to control this behavior per Space. Also, not showing menus/pages in settings continued to be pretty disruptive for me.
@RonMakesSystems is right, it is essentially non-architect mode.
It appeared a harder problem than we thought initially. So far we are thinking about these improvements
enable proper access to Settings pages even in User mode
add a shortcut to switch to this mode fast (like Shift - Shift)
tone-down the button and make it less “in your face”
??? hiding spaces from Admins can be weird, since if we do it, all spaces will be hidden from admins till the admin adds herself to these spaces explicitly. So we maybe solve it in a different feature that is not related to architect mode
This is indeed another feature and I hope we will do it someday.
!