Navbar Search should provide hints for what can be searched as we expand out functionality
Insight
- When they began to use global search, participants lacked knowledge about what types of content they could search for aside from projects, issues, and merge requests
Supporting evidence
- Research Report - Slide 19
- Users had to explore the search functionality to discover what it could find and how it could filter/sort results
Action
- Provide better communication about what types of content can be found through global search and how to use search in general
Resources
Proposal
Utilize rotating placeholder content for the navbar search field (on focus) that exposes various content and capabilities of global search.
Search Capabilities
Content types (Docs)
- Projects
- Epics – when searching within group only (Premium +)
- Issues
- Merge requests
- Wiki
- Code
- Commits
- Comments
- Milestones
- Users
Autocomplete search functionality (Docs)
- Recent Issues, Merge requests, Epics (premium +)
- Settings (very limited at this point - probably not include)
- Some help documentation (also pretty limited at this point, example below)
Help example
More details can be found in this code file.
Other unique search capabilities (could be worth including)
🚧 Implementation Guide
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Update the placeholder content for the navbar search field when it is focused (see design below) to rotate between different hint/tip options.
-
The placeholder content should update (rotate options) whenever the field is focused. However, it would also be fine to update this on page load if this is a significantly easier way to implement.
-
The search field should still always maintain the default "Search GitLab" initial placeholder text in its non-focused state (as seen in the design).
relates to: &7254