The discussion revolves around the behavior of the sign-up button on Discourse, which disappears when scrolling down a topic page. stevenpslade questions why the sign-up button is hidden while the log-in button remains, arguing that it’s unnecessary and visually inconsistent, especially for short topic titles. Mittineague suggests that hiding the button helps with space constraints for longer titles, but stevenpslade counters that the trade-off is minimal and the behavior appears buggy. eviltrout notes the importance of a call-to-action for new users arriving at non-top posts. Mittineague mentions the log-in modal can also create accounts, though it may not be obvious. jenny1 links to a related thread, while merefield proposes an alternative solution via a guest gate component. Rizal agrees with stevenpslade’s perspective, calling the behavior silly.
Currently, the sign up button for logged out users only shows on the header when the user is at the top of the page (in a topic).
But when the user scrolls down, the sign up button is removed.
Firstly, I don’t really understand why this is desirable. Why make someone scroll back to the top just to press a button that isn’t taking up significant real estate anyways? Also, why hide the sign up button and not the log in button?
I personally think the sign up button should just stay where it is and not disappear.
With that logic, why not remove the log in button to fit in a few more characters? I just think the trade off of having one single button appear and disappear on scroll to accommodate a single word is not worth it. Also, if a title is too long and getting the “more” ellipsis, the few characters that are gained from removing the sign up button will likely not make or break the context of the question. Lastly, it just looks silly/buggy when the topic title is short.
That’s one solution! I really have a hard time understanding why it is not just best to keep it on top though. Again, the log in button doesn’t go anywhere. I think a user would expect that the sign up button stays where they originally saw it. It’s hard enough signing up users without a teleporting sign up button
