We are making some changes and improvements to how subcategory hashtags display per Can we make inline links to subcategories more concise?, and at the same time are adding the same floating card functionality that you already see for user mentions e.g. if you click on @martin .
This card will show the category title, icon/emoji, description, as well as links to any parent categories. Users with permission can see the “Edit description” button, as well as the “New Topic” button, which is also category context dependent (e.g. Events categories will have a “New Event” button).
Also shown in the card is a list of the 3 latest categories in the topic. Users without permission to see a category will simply follow the hashtag link, and see no card.
It’s enabled here if you want to see for yourself before you try it on your own site. Click any category hashtag in a post to take a look, e.g. News and Events or Community Building
Will we be able to permanently disable these cards? As a user, if I click on that link I just want to go to the category page, not some intermediary step.
Also as UX feedback: how would you go from the card to the category topic list? It’s not clear from the screenshots.
It’s still a work in progress, so we’ll take feedback here into consideration and make tweaks to it before we promote the Upcoming Change to beta/stable (it’s currently still in the experimental phase).
I agree the click target could be more obvious. Perhaps the whole card should be a click target aside from any more specific elements.
I wonder if displaying the top category only on the card makes more sense now that the information of the categories is on the modal? I mean not inline anymore when using #.
I’ll definitely implement this when the separator bug is fixed! I have dozens of categories with the same slug, so including the parent category in the hastag is mandatory. I’m hoping with this change I can update the category display names to include the parent name, though. Doing so with the old method was clunky, like 1Secure > 1Secure Ideas—but this new change could flatten it to just 1Secure Ideas.
I don’t think we will keep this as an option…we have so many settings What I think I will do at least is if you double click, it will take you to the category. Also you can click the category name in the card popup.
I’m sorry but I’m skeptical about this feature. For users, being able to glance at their data in a card makes sense. But for categories or tags I fail to see the added value. If anything, this makes things worse by adding a meaningless extra step.
That’s not a realistic workaround, as it would require a user to first find that category link somewhere else. This is also making the UX worse.
Quite many of my users are using PWA. Then getting any links is a bit harder task. Otherhand, they aren’t linking categories and I bet that is true in majority of non-technical forums, where userbase is from social media, not from gaming, tech, IT etc.
I’m not a fan either. It seems like nowadays system is moving toward all-cards desing instead of getting what is looking for. Perhaps I’m so old school that I’m expecting a link beeing a easy way to get the target.
But if I as an admin can choose not to use it, then it doesn’t matter (and in my circles users, those few who has an opinion, don’t like it and if theirs taste changes, and I will move to cards right away. After all my forum is for discussion by users, not for me).
What I think I will do at least is if you double click, it will take you to the category. Also you can click the category name in the card popup.