[Fix] #0046465 UI: Remove TOP Button form Standard Form

[fhelfer]

https://mantis.ilias.de/view.php?id=46465
As suggested, there is no valid use-case where the TOP-Button of Standard Buttons has a reason to exist.
Therefore, this PR suggests removing it by default, but creating a method that allows to enable it if necessary

[oliversamoila]

Hello everyone.
For this PR, it is worth reading Fabian Kruse's summary of the discussions with @yvseiler. However, the Mantis issues marked as related also address the problem regularly, and certainly not all related and frequently reported tickets are marked here.

From a UX and UI perspective, the result looks really good. Thank you very much for your contribution, @fhelfer and Fabian Kruse.
I would recommend that @thibsy continue with the code review. Once this is done, I believe the changes could be integrated into Release 11 and Trunk. I would like to communicate the changes to the JourFixe – then we can decide whether or not the changes should still be integrated into Release 10.

Why should a careful decision be made for Release 10? There are already various forms that use the UI framework. In these cases, the upper Submit button would be missing by default and would have to be re-integrated deliberately. Very long forms are likely to be among such cases. These could be forms used to configure object settings, for example.

Below are two examples where the changes can be seen.

1. Login screen
2. Creation of test questions

Kind regards,
@oliversamoila (as UI coordinator)

---

Login form with top submit button:

Login form without top submit button

Creation of test questions form with top submit button

Creation of test questions form without top submit button:

[kergomard]

Hi @fhelfer and @oliversamoila

Thank you very much for this improvement!

If I'm understanding this right, this is actually the right move from an accessibility point of view and I agree with Fabian that also from a usability perspective this is better.

I would kindly ask you though to reconsider adding the withForcedTopButton() and isForcedTopButton functions.

Why:

• At the current stage no form will be using them. If we can live without these buttons in the forms we currently have, we can live without them indefinitely.
• This would leave it to developer to add top buttons and this again will lead to discussions on every turn as somebody will find a good reason why we need them for exactly this one single case. The decision should not be left to consumers and the forms should be kept consistent across the whole platform.

Thanks again and best,
@kergomard

[fab-kru]

Sometimes it's the little things that make you feel all fidgety with anticipation. Thanks a lot for moving this forward, @oliversamoila & @fhelfer!

One question concerning the previews: They still show a duplicate "Required *" marker on the top. It was my (probably wrong) understanding, that there would also vanish if we got rid of the buttons.

Wouldn’t that still make sense?

Cheers
Fabian

[oliversamoila]

Dear @kergomard,
Thank you very much for your feedback. I also believe that we would be doing users a real favour in terms of user-friendliness.
The idea of adding the button as an option stems from the particularly long forms in the test, course, group and user.
These are, in my opinion, the forms that are both very long and accessed quite frequently. As far as I know, KitchenSink Forms are already in use in the test and user sections, but not yet in the others.

I don't want to address the question of whether or not some of these forms should be shortened in this improvement. We want to make progress – so it doesn't help to make the problem even bigger.

For me, it's also fine if we always have only one action to submit the information at the end of a form, once I've moved through it.

Kind regards,
@oliversamoila (as UI coordinator)

[oliversamoila]

Dear @fab-kru,
Thank you for your feedback on the above Required *’ There has been quite a lengthy discussion on this topic, and a decision was made in March 2023. See Mantis 33699
However, I must admit that I do not consider this to be the ideal solution either. If we revisit the question of what can be done, I would definitely want to approach it as a separate issue. In my opinion, we also have other markings with * that are not entirely correct.
But let's take one thing after another, please. 😉

Kind regards,
@oliversamoila (as UI coordinator)

[kergomard]

Hi @oliversamoila

After having had a quick chat with @dsstrassner , I think I can greenlight the removal of the upper buttons for the Test and the User, so we would already be good for the current uses.

Best,
@kergomard

[oliversamoila]

Many thanks to everyone involved.

@thibsy and I had another discussion following the feedback and recommend generally removing the top button.
There should be no additional method that allows the display in “desired” cases. This primarily design decision is likely to be difficult for the developer to make. Furthermore, it cannot be expected or planned by the user – regardless of whether the developer explicitly places the button there or whether it is determined by a metric of the form length.
Predictability cannot be established.

Best regards,
@oliversamoila

[matthiaskunkel]

Jour Fixe, 09 FEB 2026: We had a longer discussion about screens with long forms where a top button would be helpful and make the page more usable. Nevertheless, we decide to accept this PR and remove top buttons from KS forms also because of accessibility (one submit button is better then two). We should keep on discussing how to proceed with these specific cases where long forms then would require scrolling down. One option could be a floating button - if accessible. Another could be an exception to this new behaviour and allow developers to add a top button in selected cases.
PR accepted for 11 and trunk. ILIAS 10 stays as it is.

[thibsy]

Hi @fhelfer, thx for the PR. Please rebase this onto release_11 so we can proceed. Best, @thibsy

[fhelfer]

Hey @thibsy, @oliversamoila

how would we like to proceed with top actions? After rabasing the commits i noticed that top-actions (Buttons) got introduced to the top-section of the form.
I commited a change that removes them too.