I have tackled some of theses issues by
- making categories restricted to certain groups, except for a top level Welcome category for users not logged in
- setting main site categories to viewable by TL0 so logged in users get the content common to all users
- using the groups page to allow users to “follow” restricted categories
- suppressing subcategories on hamburger menu
- adding a groups icon to the nav
This works ok for me, including creating a curated email summary for the groups that each user follows. See https://community.talkbaq.org for an example.
At scale, the menu and groups page gets unwieldy. Some ideas to consider
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group page enhancements to help with order and arrangement, “My Groups,” group categories, show group description/dated added, search, orderby (clickable) options, etc.
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simple category overview page that shows all categories and subcats on one page like a sitemap
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The new changes are great but further enhance the preference page for Categories to add a “check the box” interface.
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Show groups on profile in more pretty way and under separate tab
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Preference page for categories or groups page could be part of registration flow to let users pick their groups/categories.
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Allow generic invites not tied to an email so communities can be transitioned in more easily with group assigments when you don’t have a user’s email or you want the invite to be shareable (used with caution)
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As an alternative to groups approach. allow categories to be private but not hidden, so users know the categories exist and can get instruction in the about topic on how to join.
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Above all else–should work on mobile.
The downside to all this for me is it takes everything out of search because categories are restricted. Also users have to jump through a couple steps.
