Freeze top, left, and side banners of Canvas.

This idea has been developed and deployed to Canvas

For more information, please read through the  Canvas Release Notes (2021-10-16) - Instructure Community

 


I have suggested this in the past but it didn't seem to gain traction so I thought that I would bring the idea up again.  It is just a very annoying feature that could be correct rather easily I would imagine.  It would be nice if Canvas froze everything but the interior page.  In other words, let's say you are in the "Modules" page. When you scroll down, the way it is now everything scrolls and you lose site of your courses, grades, calendar, etc. as well as all of your global settings.  Depending on how long your "Modules" page is, for example, you even lose sight of the left hand navigation tabs as well (Home, Assignments, etc.)  I think that those should be stationary, just as if you were to lock columns or rows in Excel.

Please also refer to this closely related idea: https://community.canvaslms.com/ideas/6112-make-course-menu-sticky

 

97 Comments
eabshire
Community Novice

Becky, thanks for the thoughtful solution which, by the way, seems to be a great compromise.  But, as you can see from various responses, some would rather stick to their own personal opinion and not consider other compromises at all, even if it would seem to solve the problem at hand.  I too have voted no on certain issues, but I would like to think that if a person such as yourself came up with a thought out solution such as this I would recognize that and change my view, or at least consider it.  Sure, in this case, the screen would change a bit, but I think that in today's high tech environment individuals would learn how to adapt to that change very quickly, smart phone or not, and move forward with it.  But, change always brings resistance from those who don't like it, that is just human nature.  So we will just have to wait and see if enough folks out there are willing to support it.  If so, great.  If not, oh well.  We can raise it again another day and see if it gains traction then.  Sometimes it depends on when you present an idea in order to get it to fly!  Thanks again.

BKINNEY
Community Contributor

James,

I agree with nearly everything you've said. Especially about trying to make the browser experience more like mobile. What a giant step backward that has been. Unfortunately, the Canvas app is a huge selling point for Instructure, and indeed, we have adopters on our campus who switched from Sakai precisely because the mobile support is better. So, the best we can do is push for a better browser experience.

One of the very worst things that can happen to me in Canvas is being forced to scroll my browser horizontally. Scrolling vertically is okay, I have a scroll wheel for that. But, scrolling in any direction in order to access a menu pains me. I suppose I should train my fingers to hit ctrl-home, and maybe then I'd feel differently, but lacking that habit, I'd much rather click to open a menu than scroll. And scroll. And scroll. I really like your idea of having the course menu be an icon on the global menu. Less confusing than the hamburger, and you could have a personal setting determine whether or not the course menu is open or closed by default. For that matter, why not have positioning of the menu (when open) be a personal setting?

showland
Community Novice

I would like to add that while in edit page mode, it would be nice to have the right side editing menu (pictured below) freeze in place as well. If you're editing a long page and trying to insert an image, file, or link you have to place your cursor then scroll up to the top of the page to have access to the menu to insert your item. Then scroll back down to move your cursor, and scroll back up to insert the next item.

184957_pastedImage_1.png

I believe in the old UI this menu was frozen, because I do not recall being frustrated by this before. Sometimes my cursor accidentally moves as I'm scroll to the top, so my item gets inserted to the wrong place.

The same is true while editing a question bank. The right side menu (below) should be frozen in place so that I don't have to keep scrolling back to the top of the page to insert a new question.

185003_pastedImage_2.png

eabshire
Community Novice

Excellent points.  Thanks!

Jeff_F
Community Champion

While I recall occasions being in the middle or bottom of a discussion thread and then finding a need to go back to the top to navigate, my overall feeling is I would prefer to not have the left/top menus be static for reasons already stated.

Plus, the Home and End keys are somewhat lonely and deserve use from time to time.  ;o)

hensonj
Community Novice

This was the first thing we fixed when the new UI was introduced, as well as widening pages to take up all available screen width.

While I respect the views expressed by some about that space being taken up by the menu when scrolling, it should be noted that stock Canvas does not auto collapse the menu on scroll, so menu or not, you have the same amount of space that the content is pushed right.

Add the following to your CSS:

/*removes the max-width so that pages will utilize space on larger screens*/

#wrapper-container.ic-app-container {

    max-width: none;

}

/*makes left menu sticky*/

.ic-app-course-menu {

    position: fixed !important;

    top: 70px;

    left: 84px;

  overflow-y: scroll;

  height: 100%;

  padding-bottom: 80px;

}

/*makes left menu snap to top of page when scrolled*/

.ic-app-course-menu-fixed {

    position: fixed !important;

    top: 8px;

    left: 108px;

  overflow-y: scroll;

  height: 100%;

  width: 144px;

}

If I missed anything, please let me know.

James

eabshire
Community Novice

Thanks for that.

hensonj
Community Novice

forgot another part that allows thetinymce icons to wrap, preventing overlap once page has loaded and window size changes

/*fixes overlaps on the RCE on smaller screens sizes*/

.mce-btn-group .mce-btn {

    float: left;

}

apetersen
Community Novice

Becky

I know this isn't a big help but my mouse allows me to push the scroll wheel left or right in order to scroll sideways.

BKINNEY
Community Contributor

 @apetersen ,

Actually, it's a tremendous help. I had no idea mouse wheels could do that, but now that I try it, the mouse in my hand has a wheel that leans left to right. Unfortunately, it doesn't scroll my page when I do it, but at least now I know that such a thing is possible. That is definitely going to improve my life. Thanks.