I like Fla’s proposal more, no extra Step I have to decide. Most new user might go ahead with registration, but If I (the user) want to import something the user will finde the registration link in the short text.
There is no extra step I can see: in Fla’s initial proposal, you still have to click the ‘sign-up’ button to get to the two options. My version gives those two options on the sign-up page, in response to Jonne’s suggestion.
I actually discovered years ago that this is not obvious at all for the users. I can’t tell how many friends of mine called me saying “I can’t log in on diaspora* it’s broken!”. They registered on my pod, but then when wanting to come back, they simply entered “diaspora” in there the address bar and clicked the first link google gave them, ending on joindiaspora.com … For something as “no revert possible” as an account migration, I feel like we should remind the pod URL once again.
Yeah wording can definitely be improved, that was a quick draft to start discussion. But IMO Jonne made a good point, we should probably keep the registration form right on the first page, and then allow visitors to access the migration page if they want to. I will propose a more polished draft about this.
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So, staying with the idea of a simple link, we would have a flow like that:
The visitors click on Sign up:
They then click on the “Migrate your existing account” link and arrive on something like that:
Then they upload the archive, and the validation is done. If it’s a success, then can process with the migration:
If that step is a success, then they would arrive on a the stream with a confirmation message.
Is that flow enough, or am I missing some steps / information needed to be collected?
I will try to look at it in an hour, I hope that is early enough.
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I’ve just had a thought, and it’s more about the UX than the UI – sorry I’m bringing this at such a late stage.
Someone brought up the point earlier about whether it would be possible to choose a new account name/Diaspora ID when migrating to a new pod. If the migration feature allows a user to do this and still connect with old contacts, then the following might work better:
Keep the same registration page, adding just a note that ‘You will be able to migrate an account from another pod at the next stage.’
Once someone has chosen an ID and password, the next page has ‘Do you want to migrate another account to this one?’ YES / NO.
If the user selects YES, then the migration UI kicks in.
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About the UI in the latest mock-ups:
There’s quite a lot of small text on the migration screen. I’d like to think of ways to reduce that.
I’d also like to see the buttons and success flag conform with Diaspora’s design rather than using default button design. I’m sure this is something you’ll work on.
The text could use some editing. Could you paste it into a comment here? I could then see if I can simplify it a bit.
Regarding this, an idea that would help with this and with a new sign-up:
Once someone completes the sign-up page, and before going to the ‘Welcome/let’s get started’ screen,
Have a screen that reads, in big type:
Obviously [username] will be replaced with the user name just entered in the sign-up form.
Then a 'confirm I have made a note of this address and will not be so stupid as to google ‘diaspora’ button to get to the next screen.
Obviously needs some refining, but an idea to help new users?
(Someone migrating should probably know about this already – it’s really brand-new users who will be ignorant of it.)
@flaburgan, as an example of this, could you possibly provide quick help to this new French user? How do I get back to my account? I could, but my French would not be good.
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That sounds good to me, so we can add the import/migration to the getting started page.
The only advantage of uploading the archive before the actual registration would be, that you could use the same email as in the archive … but you still need the user to choose a username/password, and what if the user doesn’t want to re-use the mail-address (I often use different mail-addresses for different websites, so if I start receiving spam, I can see which website lost data).
So I don’t think that asking the user to re-enter the mail-address (even if wanting to use the same) isn’t too much, and I think having a more or less normal registration, and then do the import on the getting started page, sounds like a good idea.
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There is this PR which does exactly that, but via a mail, so the user can find the info again in their mailbox if they forgot them: WIP:Add a welcome email by Flaburgan · Pull Request #7823 · diaspora/diaspora · GitHub
(personally I would also like to have this welcome email combined with a verify email check, as it is already done when somebody changes the mail-address, so users don’t enter invalid mail-addresses which then bounce, or worse they add a mail-address of somebody else and spam them with notifications, so we only start sending other mails once the mail-address is verified)
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Thanks.
Given that there is no necessity for a user to provide a valid email address, I think it would be useful to display the information on-screen when someone is signing up, as many people won’t receive any email that is sent. The information could be sent as an email as well, but I think only sending it by email is not so useful. Would that be reasonable?
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I already thought about this and my solution was to send them an email: WIP:Add a welcome email by Flaburgan · Pull Request #7823 · diaspora/diaspora · GitHub this way, they can find back a link to the pod easily even months after their registration if needed. I should finish that work, I think it’s a better solution than to modify the registration flow.
It’s not late at all, it’s exactly the perfect time to discuss this.
An advantage to go this way is that the problem of the username already taken is handled right from the beginning.
It means that the user has to manually fill the username and the email, but that is probably acceptable.
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But what if they don’t add a valid email address?
I realise this point is outside the scope of this discussion about the migration UI, so perhaps there is another place better to continue this point?
So, do we want something as subtle as a simple link like this, or do we want something more prominent?
OK, sorry if I’m not being helpful, but I see it something like this (very rough idea because I don’t have time to make mock-ups).
Either:
on the main sign-up page, when the user clicks the ‘Create account’ button, options appear below:
- Continue to ‘Let’s get started’
- I want to migrate another account to this pod
or these two options appear on a new screen after clicking ‘Create account’, and then leads either to the getting started screen or to a migrate account screen.
I think it’s (a) not obvious enough in the screenshots, but also (b) doesn’t belong on a screen that’s there for someone new to Diaspora. It’s best to have the fork before landing on that screen, so one goes either to that screen to have the getting started options or goes to a screen dedicated for those migrating an account.
I hope this is helpful – I’m trying to be helpful!
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Be confident my friend! You are helpful. I kept a small link there because of the first remark of @jhass here: Backup and restore – account migration - #135 by jhass saying that most of the users won’t come from another pod, so we shouldn’t interrupt their flow. But I agree that a simple link isn’t visible enough. I’ll think about it.
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Thank you! I’m so glad you’re doing this work. I wish I could do more to be involved to support you, and others who are doing development work.
If you can think of anything I could do, please let me know. Perhaps just polishing the English text at the end.
I also think the link maybe is a bit too simple so it maybe gets overlooked easily (but also it’s not that bad since users would still be able to migrate/import also from their settings).
But I also wouldn’t want a completely separate page only for that question, because most users won’t come from another pod and don’t need to import something. So maybe replace the link with a button, or put everything inside a box like when you were invited, or something, so it’s a bit more noticeable?
Or maybe branch still on the registration page, but have two buttons below the form “Create account” and “Create account and continue with import/migration” or something like that, there could also be a little question mark providing an explanation what this button does. That should be simple enough so it doesn’t interrupt the normal registration flow, but also obvious enough so a person wanting to import a profile should notice it? 
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