"Leave" workflow action should have a hint about the current owner

[ethan.jucovy@…]

I often find myself wanting to know who is the current owner of a ticket when I am choosing to "leave" a ticket in its current state.

The UI makes this somewhat difficult, because the "Owner" field is not listed in the "Change Properties" box that appears directly above the workflow "Action" box.

In order to double-check who currently owns the ticket, I have to either:

• scroll back up to the top of the page to review the ticket's current properties
• wait for the preview to be rendered at the bottom of the page and review the ticket's new properties
• look at the OTHER workflow actions, like "Reassign", and read through its hint ("The owner will be changed from ethan to …") to see who currently owns the ticket

The last of these methods is the most "efficient" but also seems to be the least intuitive — at least, it never actually occurred to me until I was writing this ticket. :-) As a user I've developed a habit of either scrolling to the top or waiting for the preview in order to check the ticket's current owner whenever I'm "leaving" a ticket in its current state.

Adding a hint to the "leave" action would be an easy solution. If the "leave" action had a hint like "The owner will remain ethan", then I would be able to see the current owner at a glance without needing to think too hard about it:

trac/ticket/default_workflow.py

@@ -323 +323 @@
             control.append(_('as %(status)s ',
                              status= ticket._old.get('status',
                                                      ticket['status'])))
+            hints.append(_("The owner will remain %(current_owner)s", 
+                           current_owner=current_owner))
         else:
             if status != '*':
                 hints.append(_("Next status will be '%(name)s'", name=status))

[Christian Boos]

Good idea!

Suggesting the following improvement:

default_workflow.py

@@ -226 +226 @@
         this_action = self.actions[action]
         status = this_action['newstate']
         operations = this_action['operations']
-        current_owner = ticket._old.get('owner', ticket['owner'] or '(none)')
+        current_owner_or_empty = ticket._old.get('owner', ticket['owner'])
+        current_owner = current_owner_or_empty or '(none)'
         if not (Chrome(self.env).show_email_addresses
                 or 'EMAIL_VIEW' in req.perm(ticket.resource)):
             format_user = obfuscate_email_address
@@ -323 +324 @@
             control.append(_('as %(status)s ',
                              status= ticket._old.get('status',
                                                      ticket['status'])))
+            hints.append(_("The owner will remain %(current_owner)s",
+                           current_owner=current_owner)
+                         if current_owner_or_empty else
+                         _("The ticket will remain without an owner"))
         else:
             if status != '*':
                 hints.append(_("Next status will be '%(name)s'", name=status))

Not 100% sure about the grammar though (or "with no owner"?).

Also, I hope this will not introduce doubts about what happens with the owner for the other actions where the owner won't change (e.g. assign / unassign / resolve). I don't want to add the "remains" hint for all of them, sounds too verbose. So unless someone has a better idea, I'm fine with the proposed change.

[ethan.jucovy@…]

Replying to cboos:

Not 100% sure about the grammar though (or "with no owner"?).

I guess "The ticket will remain unowned" would be more grammatical. But personally I prefer your version even though it's a little stilted — I think it's useful to leave the word "owner" in the hint so that it's easier to understand what's referred to while scanning the page quickly. In that sense I think "with no owner" is best, because the phrase "no owner" is so easy to spot.

Also, I hope this will not introduce doubts about what happens with the owner for the other actions where the owner won't change (e.g. assign / unassign / resolve). I don't want to add the "remains" hint for all of them, sounds too verbose. So unless someone has a better idea, I'm fine with the proposed change.

I was a little worried about that. I think it's less unclear with those other actions, because they have some hint that says what will change, so it's reasonable to infer that everything unmentioned will be unchanged.

[ethan.jucovy@…]

Replying to ethan.jucovy@…:

I think it's less unclear with those other actions, because they have some hint that says what will change, so it's reasonable to infer that everything unmentioned will be unchanged.

…which made me realize that my patch is completely broken if you customize your workflow at all, e.g.

leave = * -> *
leave.default = 1
leave.operations = leave_status, set_owner

With my patch, this will result in a nonsensical hint like "The owner will be changed from ethan to the selected user. The owner will remain ethan."

Here's a new patch which should avoid that problem, by only appending the new hint if "leave_status" is the ONLY active operation:

trac/ticket/default_workflow.py

@@ -226 +226 @@
         this_action = self.actions[action]
         status = this_action['newstate']
         operations = this_action['operations']
-        current_owner = ticket._old.get('owner', ticket['owner'] or '(none)')
+        current_owner_or_empty = ticket._old.get('owner', ticket['owner'])
+        current_owner = current_owner_or_empty or '(none)'
         if not (Chrome(self.env).show_email_addresses
                 or 'EMAIL_VIEW' in req.perm(ticket.resource)):
             format_user = obfuscate_email_address
@@ -323 +324 @@
             control.append(_('as %(status)s ',
                              status= ticket._old.get('status',
                                                      ticket['status'])))
+            if len(operations) == 1:
+                hints.append(_("The owner will remain %(current_owner)s",
+                               current_owner=current_owner)
+                             if current_owner_or_empty else
+                             _("The ticket will remain with no owner"))
         else:
             if status != '*':
                 hints.append(_("Next status will be '%(name)s'", name=status))

[Christian Boos]

Replying to ethan.jucovy@…:

Thanks, applied in r11778.