Re: [pgAdmin4][RM#3055] Allow user to sort the data in View data mode

On Wed, Mar 28, 2018 at 11:20 AM, Dave Page <dpage@pgadmin.org> wrote:

On Wed, Mar 28, 2018 at 2:54 PM, Robert Eckhardt <reckhardt@pivotal.io> wrote:

On Wed, Mar 28, 2018 at 4:12 AM, Dave Page <dpage@pgadmin.org> wrote:

On Wed, Mar 28, 2018 at 1:37 AM, Robert Eckhardt <reckhardt@pivotal.io> wrote:

On Tue, Mar 27, 2018 at 9:54 AM, Murtuza Zabuawala <murtuza.zabuawala@enterprisedb.com> wrote:

On Tue, Mar 27, 2018 at 7:06 PM, Robert Eckhardt <reckhardt@pivotal.io> wrote:

On Tue, Mar 27, 2018 at 6:25 AM, Murtuza Zabuawala <murtuza.zabuawala@enterprisedb.com> wrote:

On Tue, Mar 27, 2018 at 3:13 PM, Dave Page <dpage@pgadmin.org> wrote:

On Mon, Mar 26, 2018 at 9:26 PM, Robert Eckhardt <reckhardt@pivotal.io> wrote:

On Mon, Mar 26, 2018 at 2:07 PM, Joao De Almeida Pereira <jdealmeidapereira@pivotal.io> wrote:

Hi Hackers,

@Murtuza: The patch codewise looks good. Nice to see that we are using axios instead of jquery ajax calls and that there is some coverage for the change.

Nevertheless the Javascript testing looks a bit slim and could be improved. Also the DataSorting class could have some other member functions like the model validation could be extracted out so that it is easily tested. 

@Hackers: This was how we tried to test this feature:

1 - Started pgAdmin

2 - Opened the query tool for a specific server

3 - Executed a SQL statment

4 - Pressed the column header to try to order, nothing happened

5 - Right clicked the column header to see if it was there the option, nothing

This is the behavior that we were expecting, not to have to open Data View and then press the icon that is not even near the grid in order to sort the column. Is this really the way we want people to use the grid in pgAdmin? Should it be more intuitive?

Have we considered making the grid behave more like excel or other grids? I think that having the ascending and descending inside the column header, we could similarly provide filtering. Something that would give users a more intuitive place to look.

Doing the sorting via header clicks is convenient but very restrictive. How do you specify multiple columns to sort by for example? The current design allows you to select columns and the sort order as you see fit.

Honestly I'm not sold on my idea, I was just proposing an alternative in an effort to start a discussion about the user experience. Ideally what I'd like to see, maybe this happened, is some user research. When we initial worked on refactoring the results grid we made a bunch of changes. One of the things we intended to do was to follow up to see how people were using the grid now so that we could better understand how it was now being used in order to design and implement features just like this. Clearly we haven't gotten there yet. 

 

 

Another reason we can't use that because w

e have already occupied that behaviour for selecting entire column

​ when user clicks on header.

As Dave suggested, I will be merging it with filter dialog meaning it will be accessible via direct button on toolbar & keyboard shortcut.​

​

How are users currently interacting with that filter dialog? 

​By clicking on the toolbar button as well as keyboard shortcut.

​

 

 

Sorry I wasn't clear. My question was more along the lines of, do we know if people are using the filter functionality?  What kind of filters are people using?  What do they like about it? What do they wish they could do above and beyond sorting, etc. 

Yes, they are, based on the fact we've had issues reported in the past. We have no idea how they are using it.

Sorting is a separate feature that is often requested. The only reason it's connected here is that both functionalities in pgAdmin 3 were managed through the same dialogue which based on lack of complaints from users, generally worked for them. I do know that the proposed "click on headers" approach will not work for me, as I have multi-part keys in databases which I like to sort by in specific ways.

As far as the 'click on header' is concerned I think Murtuza's objection is very valid. I think my overall point is that I believe that sorting and filtering is a legitimate pain but it is a pain I don't fully understand. The solution as presented certainly works it just doesn't feel nice. My concern is that it won't be clear to users what they should do or expect since the UX is unique to pgAdmin.

Right now my concern is getting us back to feature parity in this area with pgAdmin 3, as users are complaining. Longer term we can look at further improvements or redesigns as resources allow.

Totally fair. 

 

 

Less of a concern is that all of these changes are only happening with the 'view data' section of the code and I would assume that people who have queried the DB will also have the need to sort and filter without necessarily rewriting their SQL. 

That doesn't concern me - there are already very distinct differences in the two modes for the tool. If/when we have a suitable parser on the front end we'll be able to dynamically switch between read-write modes and update sorting criteria in hand-crafted SQL. Until that large amount of work is done, we have two distinct modes, one with generated SQL and writeable data, the other with hand-crafted SQL and read-only data.

Also totally fair. As an aside, we are about to spin up some user interviews for the large number of objects but during those interviews we were planning to add some follow up questions on the work we did on the data grid. If pushing this as is until it can be prioritized is something that is needed to get the heat off of you I'm ok with that. 

I do think we will spend a little time with users so I can better understand the issues being faced and we will absolutely share that feedback here.