Perfect for returning to the tag once I’m done to read some other threads!
But when I get to the bottom of a thread and decide to return to the tag, I have an automatic reflex: scroll up. Probably this is because on many sites the back button is on a non fixed header up there.
Every time I realize within moments that the shortcut is actually always at the top already but now, suddenly, it’s gone!
I don’t think this behaviour has changed recently, it’s always been this way since we migrated to Discourse. When you scroll up it changes to show the site logo, to let you return to the homepage quickly. If you want the topic title/category you can just scroll down a little again.
What is technically happening: When you’re at the top of the thread, there is a continuous banner across the top with the IF logo and the name of the site. This entire banner is a link back to “home” - the list of topics or categories, whichever you’ve set in your preferences.
When you start scrolling down through a topic, the wide banner is replaced by a smaller version of the IF boxed logo on the left (this should still be the same “home” link) and the text of the topic title you are in. The topic title is a “return to top” link which will scroll up to the original post, at which time the wide banner to navigate “home” also returns.
This behavior should be the same on both the mobile and desktop versions of the site (and is actually standard behavior for any Discourse site), but since the scale on your phone is smaller, it may be a little harder to accurately pick out the IF logo to return home. I have developed the habit on mobile of just tapping the banner twice to get back to the topic list, or swiping left-to-right for “previous page” the way you would with an e-book if your mobile browser does that.
I think I only noticed it recently because the newest update of mobile Chrome is pure garbage. Not only do they have the normal header at the top with address bar and tab buttons, but they’ve added a footer that contains tab groups to take up even more of the limited real estate. And neither one likes to disappear while scrolling down, especially on short pages.
None of this actually has anything to do with the site, but I think it drew my attention to the shortcuts disappearing.
The problem I have is that what I want to do is click one of the tags in the topic (like IFComp or Competitions or the like) but they disappear as soon as I scroll up at all, even if I haven’t scrolled back up to the top of the current topic. Like if I scroll all the way to the bottom and scroll up just a half-inch, they all disappear and all I have is the homepage link.
Maybe that’s what you just described and I didn’t quite understand. Anyway, I find it a bit counter-intuitive because I would think scrolling up indicates a desire on the user’s part to return back somewhere, and thus contextually the page ought to show a header with link to the owning tags, etc. but maybe that’s not what other people find intuitive.
Anyway, as I said, it’s not a huge peeve of mine. I just figured I’d throw it out there.
Yeah, all bets are off with a mobile browser. I frequently find if I need to do a detailed reply with quotes, or handle admin functions that I may as well not even bother until I get back to a desktop computer because everything is so different and finicky on mobile.
