Add a preference setting to ignore user statuses
Release notes
Get less distracted by users statuses in the GitLab UI by using a new setting to hide them for you.
Problem to solve
People at GitLab are using a lot the status feature, I'd like to even say abusing it. 99% of the statuses don't reflect any particular status, they just use a nice random icon, and sometimes a generic text like "If you want to get my attention, ping me". This is highly inefficient:
- We're working asynchronously at GitLab, so if I really need an answer from someone, I'll check their calendar or even their status on slack (PTO is adding status icons automatically now).
- If someone commented 100 hundred times in an issue, I get 100 small eye-catchy icons. Our UI is already a rainbow of colors with the labels, I don't need more colors, especially when it doesn't bring me any value. It's just too distracting.
I want to be able to completely ignore them, by hiding them.
Intended users
Everyone who use GitLab extensively would use that at some point.
User experience goal
The user should be able to user the UI with GitLab to disable all status icons.
Proposal
The user should be able to check a box in the Preferences settings to hide all status icons.
Further details
It's pretty straightforward as it already.
Permissions and Security
Documentation
Update https://docs.gitlab.com/ee/user/profile/preferences.html
Availability & Testing
Available Tier
Free
What does success look like, and how can we measure that?
Number of activation of the setting.
What is the type of buyer?
Is this a cross-stage feature?
No
Links / references
/cc @mikelong since it's mostly a UX issue to me