Usability: Order of status and error messages

Moving all usability issues to Drupal - component usability.

If adding a $weight, does it add another layer of complexity to drupal_set_message?
For usability, a message related to a specific widget on the page should actually be displayed alongside a widget on the page, such as beside a text field or a select list. However, the current drupal_set_message is not able to do so. If implementing $weight, the order of messages is going to depend on an arbitrary number, which is a bad solution.

Current drupal_set_message stores messages in a queue, so messages are shown first-come-first-serve. Unless we plan to get the call stack to maintain a certain order of the messages, I don't think the issue is going to be resolved.

From a ux point of view, I'd expect messages to be sorted on cardinality: errors first, then warnings, then status.
Currently not the case:

Tagging this accessibility.
We got dinged on WCAG Accessibility testing for "the list of errors are wrongly not in the same order as the order of the fields". In testing we found users disoriented by the seemingly random sequence of the errors in relation of the sequence of the form (which describes the general Usability problem) however for people with Cognitive disabilities this adds an additional unnecessary level of confusion and disorientation. Relevant sections of WCAG 2.0 include 1.3.2 "Meaningful Sequence" and 3.3.1 "Error Identification".

Just adding a related issue. Form errors are going to get a lot better soon I think.

It should make it much easier for people to identify what to fix.

WCAG requirements 1.3.2 & 3.3.1 are both WCAG 2.0 A level requirements, but usually issues around cognitive disabilities are AAA.

I can see some advantages to being able to weight the errors, but not sure how often this is likely to come up.

I do like @yoroy point of ordering by cardinality.

drupal_set_message() is deprecated so at the very least this needs an issue summary update.

But do we think this is still worth pursuing? Lack of replies suggests there isn't much interest, and I don't think it's a bug but rather a feature request or a task.

We discussed this issue at #3220445: Drupal Usability Meeting 2021-06-25.

The original suggestion of providing an optional weight parameter does not seem like it would solve the problem. The code that creates the message does not know what other messages are being generated, so it is not the right place to make that decision.

We agree with #20: there seems to be a lack of interest in this issue. We recommend either closing the issue (won't fix) or rewriting it to follow the suggestion in #5. That is, keep the messages grouped by priority, but show them in the order error, warning, status (same as on the site status report).

Updated the IS with the options.

It is now time to decide on option A or B in the proposed resolution. What do you think?

I vote won't fix, at least as the issue is currently framed. I have had this in mind since I found the issue last year and have concluded it isn't the case that we should *always* show an error first.

Example: on a site that has pending security updates, an error message appears on *every page*. In this scenario, currently a success message appears before the error, which in my opinion is correct. The success message is new information and it's gone on subsequent page loads. There might be several of these persistent errors on a site and if you showed the success message after these, it could be buried and even difficult to spot.

I can't actually think of a way to produce both an error and a success message *from the same action* as shown in the original IS. I propose that if there are situations where this is possible, and it still is the case that errors come last, we should identify them individually and see if there is logical improvement.

Also thanks @benjifisher and the UX folks for taking the time to consider this!

Messages go through the theme layer too, so sites can already opt to do this if they want

So I vote for won't fix too

I also feel this is a feature request rather than a bug

Messages go through the theme layer too

If you think that #5 is a good idea (display errors first) then this issue could be moved to the theme system (or the individual core themes).

Sorry, I was pointing out that if a site felt particularly strongly about the order messages should show in, then it can implement custom ordering in the theme, i.e. there are ways to customise this already and therefore another vote for option A

OK I'm going to go ahead and close. I don't think it's viable as a feature request in broad form given the example I provided. Plus @larowlan pointed out that it can be controlled in the theme anyway so folks can opt to go there if they want.

If there are scenarios that can produce the same output as in the OP, let's create a new ticket to address them.

Just to add to what's been said, during the UX Call I brought up the idea that a site could decide to completely change how status messages are handled, they might decide to take the "notification toasts" approach, where messages appear as a floating element in the corner, and use Ajax to fetch them on a recurring basis, thereby meaning the order would then be first-come-first-serve.

So absolutely agree that this is a won't fix and with what has been said.