I found a slight inconsistency in the UI that confused a user today. When you mute a subcategory, it is then hidden from the list in the parent category from Show subcategory list above topics in this category. For example, I muted advertising in the plugins category, if you then go to plugins, it is hidden:
But, on the main categories page it is still visible:
Super rare situation, but it seems to me that the category shouldn’t be hidden from view like this, or is it intended?
It’s intended to hide the category. When you mute a topic it’s no longer visible in the latest topic list, so this is a similar behavior for categories.
I believe the difference is latest vs featured. Mute hides categories and topics from latest topic lists, but not from featured topic lists.
I think your screenshot is of the “Categories with featured topics” layout? If so, then it’s similar to this previous request for mobile: Allow hiding of muted topics from categories page on mobile
I don’t have much of an opinion on hiding vs showing muted categories, but it does feel like we should use the same behavior for both featured and latest.
To me, it feels like the subcategory list is an extension of the categories with featured topics layout. I know I’m in the minority using categories as my home page rather than latest though. For example, if you go to my home page https://community.naturephotographers.network/ and then go to Image Galleries, it’s a natural progression of hierarchy.
If the category is intended to be hidden it should be hidden on categories with featured topics as well, but it has to be more clear in the description of muted that this will happen since it will not be easy to get back to the category then. There almost needs to be a tracking option of ‘hidden’ for categories to hide it everywhere, not that I want another option to confuse users, but just throwing out ideas.
