Update: CS section is getting a layout update in order to match the rest of the site

Laurie, will KA be removing indication of progress icons on the CS the Table of Contents like the rest of the site?

If so, can you please explain how students are supposed to navigate to where they left off in a particular subject from the TOC?

How does a student know when or where new material has been added without clicking through each and every sub-topic?

You'll still be able to view progress in the table of contents at the topic level - that will remain unchanged.

Which is similar to how progression through topics are shown in the other subjects of the site: 

Regarding knowing when new content is added, to my knowledge nothing around that ability to changing in CS - how would you identify new material in the current CS layout?

@Laurie Thanks for the reply

"You'll still be able to view progress in the table of contents at the topic level - that will remain unchanged. Which is similar to how progression through topics are shown in the other subjects of the site: "

Yes. But how do you know which Topic Level TOC to check if their is no indication on the Main TOC like below???

For example, I can clearly see that the 2nd topic HTML/CSS is complete. Without this indication at the Main TOC level you have to guess where you left off and check each and every topic to find it. If KA is tracking progress at the Topic Level why not at the Main Level?

"Regarding knowing when new content is added, to my knowledge nothing around that ability to changing in CS - how would you identify new material in the current CS layout?"

Laurie, with all due respect  and gratitude for what I'm imagine is a voluntary position, I just have to ask if you even use the site?

Look at the example below:

Do you see the three icons that I marked with a discreet orange arrows? They were previously completed topics, with no empty space in the outer ring. Very simple and understandable in any language.

Now, because new content was added while my children were busy moving on to the next topics in line, there are once again empty spaces in the outer ring.

That's how you identify new material in the current CS layout.

The question you asked me is what I've been asking you. How is a student going to find new material in the redesigned CS format? 

Before I start, I love KA, but there are problems that annoy me.

Thanks for bringing this up Rhondavw, I agree with you in all ways. I love the old process meters which indicate your progress with a simple glance. The new updates have removed those and it is much more difficult to know your current progress and if new content is added. (Pixar in a box still uses the meters, and they help so much; as usual!)

In fact, I've not reported a friendly glitch which takes me back to the old design and progress meters... and I don't think I will since it helps me out greatly. (Incase someone finds it and does report it, please don't fix it since it's helpful) I know KA is now determined to transform to this new style, and I'll go along with that; I'll just keep using the old layout.

JettB Can you email the glitch? My username at yahoo. On top of the inability for kids to keep track of where they've been on the site, they also have to deal with video TOCs that are mismatched. By that I mean when you watch a video, sometimes the TOC that is on the side of the video is not the one you descended from, as KA uses the same video in several places and doesn't give them separate IDs. As a consequence, once the vdeo is watched and they click to go to the next video/challenge in line they are often taken to a different subject. 

As I've said, since the update we spend more time trying to navigate the site than we do use it.

@Laurie, to clarify the problem, below is the new TOC for 7th grade.

How does someone returning to the site know where to resume their studies at? 

Khan Academy's slogan is "You can learn anything." There just isn't "anyway" to find it now.

In the new CS layout, the option for the hotlist has been removed. I've found a bug to get it still. Can you fix the bug and add the hotlist option back?

How to Get to the Hotlist:

1. From, "Computer Programming," scroll down until you find, "Community Questions."

2. Click on it.

3. Click on the, "< COMPUTER PROGRAMMING," text and it will take you back to the old CS layout.

4. Click on, "Browse Projects."

"I'll be the first one to acknowledge that the original update wasn't exactly universally loved when it came out" which is why we are now rolling it out to more people, yea! 

Here are the complaints made on the linked post, and whether or not KA has fixed them. Of 9 complaints, 4 fails, 3 no-ruling, and 2 fixed issues. 

1. You can't see overall progress of a topic in Table of Contents.

@ Matthias

All of the reasons that led KA to fix #5 apply equally to #1.

Partner content exists in one place here: https://www.khanacademy.org/partner-content/ they just won't ad a link to it. I've been told they want a "seamless look" but by separating the content they create the seams they're trying to avoid.

Harder to navigate because everything is spread out over 2 or 3 pages more than it should be. 

Videos also don't automatically "rewind". 

Rhonda is seeing what I'm seeing as well...

I'm still waiting for and wanting the progress indicators: those circles that tell your progress at a simple glance. Those were extremely helpful; and as I said before, they're so helpful that I'm using a glitch to continue to view my progress that way. :D

I hope I'm not sounding too critical, but it's definitely needed for improvements to be made.

Thanks for all this feedback! I’m a designer at Khan Academy who worked on the content library redesign! My role focused mostly on recreating the content (video, article, exercise) pages and global navigation.

We have two major groups of users on Khan Academy: just-in-time learners and sustained learners. Just-in-time learners come in looking for help in a specific topic area. Sustained learners work through topics from start to finish. The content library was redesigned to focus on the just-in-time learner. We focused on the just-in-time learner because we had never designed specifically for them! Previously, with the missions and Computer Science platforms, we were more focused on the sustained learner. It’s hard for us to design a library that works for both types of learners because they have very different needs!

The good news is that we are in the process of improving our content library and better progress indicators are part of that initiative! Unfortunately, we’re not sure when or what they will look like. I can tell you that you’ll most likely see it happen in Computer Science first as we know progress tracking is crucial to this curriculum!

Please let me know if you have any other questions!

Thanks for commenting Elizabeth, it cleared up a lot for me!

@Elizabeth

Thanks for making yourself available to answer questions from users.

If "progress tracking is crucial to this curriculum" why was it removed in the first place? You are already calling for the data at the Subject Menu level and the Topic level. Why would you skip the Table of Contents level? 

As for not being sure what progress indicators will look like, why wouldn't you just use the same icons you used before or copy the style used at the Topic level and keep things consistent?

@Rhonda

These are all great questions!

We are already planning to test the original progress indicators in the Table of Contents, so you might see them reintroduced in the next few weeks. We originally took them out because we made the topic icons smaller in the Table of Contents. In doing so, we thought that having progress rings alongside the topic icons would be too busy.

@Elizabeth

Plans to restore Progress Indication at the TOC level is great news.

I want to ask you the same question I've asked others countless times only because I see other similar design features that stem from the same issue and make KA harder to use than it was before.

Once the decision to remove Progress Indicators at the TOC level was made, how did the designers intend for students to navigate back to where they left off in a particular subject from the TOC?

And without the Progress Rings around the TOC icons, how does a student know when or where new material has been added without clicking through each and every sub-topic?

Again, thanks for the news. 

@Rhonda

Again, these are all great questions!

We hoped learners would use the dashboard on the homepage to continue subjects they have worked on recently. Unfortunately we didn’t make this easy on the subjects level! Like I said before, it’s hard for us to design for all types of learners. Sometimes we make decisions that might feel confusing because they benefit a different use case.

With the new design, we can easily feature new content in its own shelf on the subject level! This feature hasn’t been built yet, but if you look now, we have shelves titled “Staff Picks.” In the future, we’ll have shelves that say “Recently added.”

I hope this answers your questions!