Another idea that I just had—since you can set default notification settings for Groups, I wonder if it makes sense to set sidebar defaults there as well.
Just trying anything so that sidebar has some level of consistency with notification settings.
Sorry to pest, it’s just that it seems to obvious that these feature sets be related somehow.
Reviving here in light of working with @nathank’s Custom Homepage. I’m wondering if there’s an appetite still for this, or if I should go the custom route (which is fine).
My Discourse utopia is:
Could be my use case is unique enough. But I’m open to people poking holes in the logic.
I think that this would be brilliant, and ties together the existing functionality nicely.
At present, I manually force users (via the Rails console) of certain groups to have subcategories of interest to them in their sidebar - otherwise they simply can’t find them unless they have a notification.
I’m less sure of this, as it becomes tricky when people have more than one interest - this has happened to us as our site has grown, and has limited its utility significantly.
Hey, I’ll take 1 out of 2. Now let’s beg the crew to make it happen.
Bump: Curious if any reps from Discourse have it on their radar to revisit this? I can go the custom route, but that seems immensely complex and messy (and potentially unnecessary should Discourse reconsider).
Hey @ncaming215 this still isn’t near the top of our list anywhere.
There is a lot we want to do to make Discourse simpler for new users, so I’m certainly sympathetic to the feedback here that this space is a worthy candidate of getting a closer look in that regard.
Currently we are looking more at other areas in this general space of improving the general user experience in areas like registration, the composer, and notifications. You’re welcome to keep bumping this periodically on a reasonable cadence as you have been to check in, though.
Thanks for this, Dave.
I’ve been running an online forum for around ~25 years, and in my full time gig, I work for a YC start-up. So, just lending my perspective for what it’s worth:
So with that segue (yes, I’m gonna pitch the team again here): the sidebar, in its current state, is a mere utility—a shortcut—to simply navigate. But that’s it. If it disappeared tomorrow, users/admins would simply carry on as they always had. In that regard, it’s another UX layer. Like an additional onramp to the same destination.
But what if the sidebar facilitated both NOTIFICATIONS and TRACKING? 
Suddenly, tracking (and by extension notifications) is no longer buried multiple layers into the preferences. It’s right in front of a user. Seamlessly adjusted as they browse.
(And in the future, AI could assist in adjusting tracking preferences for a user, like, say, an engineer who visits the same site multiple times for TypeScript topics, but can’t be bothered to adjust his/her preferences—the site would simply adjust it for them. But that’s for another day …).
Anyway, my point is the following: users are browsing more sites/apps than they ever have before. They don’t use a site like admins do. They don’t have time/patience to figure out how to manage their preferences as a site evolves. Nor should they be confused that adjusting their sidebar in zero way reflects what’s in their account preferences. WE SHOULD FLATTEN THAT EXPERIENCE FOR THEM!
OK, pitch done.
Regardless, love the team and all they do here. ~
I should add that I recently had a user (yes, yes, a focus group of one) complain that they couldn’t adjust their tracking preferences — come to find out, they were trying to use the sidebar!). But I suspect this person is not alone.
I completely agree that this suggested feature would markedly improved the UX of Discourse.
My users (even the savvy ones) struggle with the current notification controls. Having an effective overview embedded in the first layer of the UI would be a game changer in my opinion.