Composer does not display category, tag and title when fullscreen and new topic

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Users report that when composing a new topic in Discourse, switching to fullscreen mode hides the category, tag, and title fields. tkforbes explains that this forces users to exit fullscreen to fill these required fields, often requiring two clicks of the “Create Topic” button. This issue is also present when editing posts and was noted by MDNJ, who is using the composer redesign.

awesomerobot suggests this behavior may be intentional to create a “focused writing mode,” referencing previous discussions. However, MDNJ argues that mobile fullscreen still displays the category dropdown, creating inconsistency, and proposes a toggle between “Writing” and “Settings” views on mobile to maximize space while keeping options accessible. They suggest desktop fullscreen should simply display all options.

chapoi acknowledges the annoyance of the double-click requirement and leans toward removing the “focus design” in favor of standard fullscreen behavior. Regarding MDNJ’s suggestion for a unified settings view, chapoi notes that such a concept was previously mocked up but not implemented due to its complexity.

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When composing a new topic, the composer only occupies part of the screen and all the regular boxes are displayed.

When I switch to fullscreen mode (where there is even more space to work on the composition), the category, tag and title boxes disappear.

If I enter the text of my topic body and hit “Create Topic”, the composer returns to partial screen mode where I can again enter category, tag and title. However, the behaviour is confusing if the author is trained to fill those boxes before attempting to publish their topic to the forum, and it requires that the Create Topic button be hit twice.

In Reply mode, the behaviour is fine and does not conflict with the natural flow.

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2

I have noticed the same thing.

*I’m using the composer redesign Upcoming change.

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3

If the author edits their topic post (say a few minutes after initial publication), the same thing happens in full screen mode.

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4

I believe this was intentional as an effort to make fullscreen a more focused writing mode (has come up before Fullscreen view of creating a new topic looks buggy - Is that intentional?) but maybe this is something we can reconsider with our composer redesign work, any thoughts one way or the other @chapoi?

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That is a good point on maximizing space on mobile. But it actually shows a category dropdown on mobile, while the fullscreen view on desktop shows nothing at all.

Maybe on mobile a single toggle can switch between Writing and Settings: with an overview of all possible options including category, tags, enabling voting, whisper, visibility, timers etc. That would free up even more space, simplify, and add more features all in one go.

Fullscreen desktop mode should just show all of them options i guess.

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Not really. It depends if our philosophy is “full screen” (as it’s named today) or “focussed writing mode”, which seems to be intention as you say.

I do agree that the double ‘create’ click is a tad annoying, and I’d be personally happy with just full screen, without the focus design.

Haha, I mocked something up like that way-back-when but it’s a big cheese move so it didn’t make it (yet!)

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