Just about the only thing I don’t like about N8N is the UI for navigating around workflow canvases!
I think that given that workflows are the core of the UI, this is actually a pretty important feature.
To pull up a random workflow from my space that isn’t even that crowded or big:
So let’s say that I want to work on the end of the automation, the node that comes after the AI agent:
What I would naturally try to do is use the arrow keys to navigate around the canvas but that doesn’t seem to work
Unless I’m mistaken, so long as the current nodes fit within the navigation you have to zoom in or out in order to get the mini-map to display and you can then move it around to adjust the center or focus point. This is … a bit cumbersome!
Mini Map
Just in case that’s not what it’s actually called … here’s the UI element that I’mr referring to:
My UI Suggestions / Feature Requests
These are two suggestions in one because I think that both are very closely related to ease of use on the canvas:
1: Arrow navigation: Provide keyboard shortcuts which bind to moving the center point around
Zoom in and zoom out shortcuts, Map2, Minus and Plus to zoom in and out.
2: The minimap is a really useful feature when you’re dealing with big automations and I’d love to be able to select it through some other means than toggling my zoom and waiting for it to become active. Perhaps another keyboard shortcut could come up to allow users to deliberately undock the minimap and be able to use it that way.
These are small UI changes that I think would make it a lot easier to navigate around big workflows!