## Problem The CI/CD Catalog's content-rendering, navigation, and discovery experience has accumulated a set of real, individually-reported issues that have never been rolled up into a single assessable backlog. None is catastrophic alone, but together they erode trust: markdown, Mermaid, and JSON-table content that renders correctly in a project's default branch but fails or shows raw syntax once published to the catalog; navigation that can't deep-link into a specific README section or generate a shareable per-component URL; and no way to filter search by category or judge a component's trustworthiness beyond a single easy-to-miss verification badge. A user who hits a broken Mermaid diagram or a dead README anchor has no way to know whether the fault is the catalog's or the component's. ## Scope **In scope — open items:** - Component inputs with defined options aren't surfaced in the catalog UI ([#534907](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/work_items/534907)) - Markdown includes work pre-publish but break (raw syntax shown) once a version is released ([#535574](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/work_items/535574)) - Subcomponent READMEs aren't surfaced when multiple components share a project ([#540864](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/work_items/540864)) - Mermaid diagrams and syntax highlighting don't render — the catalog's markdown pipeline doesn't include GFM ([#421923](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/work_items/421923)) - `json:table` syntax doesn't render in the catalog view, though it renders correctly in-project ([#450260](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/work_items/450260)) - README section deep-links land on the wrong tab instead of the anchored section ([#514019](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/work_items/514019)) - No unique per-tab/per-component URLs, making it hard to share a specific component or section ([#499126](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/work_items/499126)) - No easy path from a local editor/IDE into the catalog while authoring CI files ([#424483](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/work_items/424483)) - No category filters in catalog search ([#444471](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/work_items/444471)) - No endorsement/trust signal beyond the verification badge; proposed MVC is surfacing source-repo stars ([#460402](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/work_items/460402)) - Catalog doesn't preserve scroll/page position on navigation ([#415843](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/work_items/415843)) **Already shipped (kept for record):** - Copy button resized on the details page ([#498048](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/work_items/498048)) - Archived-project badge added for affected components ([#537608](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/work_items/537608)) - Repository link added to the catalog list view ([#540872](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/work_items/540872)) **Out of scope:** - Release/publish process work — moved to the #12788 / &15242 reconciliation. That's a release-engineering concern, not a UX one. - On-boarding / first-run experience for orgs with an empty catalog — tracked under the new org-scoped-model UI epic; formerly &11350, now closed (children resolved 2026-08-05). - The verification-level-hierarchy browse/search redesign — its own epic, see `2026-08-05-epic-catalog-discoverability-trust-signals.md`. #444471 and #460402 above are related precursor work; cross-link, don't merge. - Composite components, structured inputs, and authoring ergonomics — its own epic, see `2026-08-05-epic-catalog-composition-authoring-ergonomics.md`. ## Success criteria - Markdown, Mermaid, and JSON-table content renders identically in the catalog as it does in-project, pre- and post-publish. - Users can deep-link to a specific README section or component and land on the correct tab. - Search supports category filtering. - Page/scroll position is preserved on back-navigation. ## Relationship to other epics Sibling to the two new strategic epics this rationalization spun out (discoverability/trust signals; composition/authoring ergonomics) and to the #12788/&15242 release-process reconciliation. All three were originally miscategorized under this epic's "UX Improvements Complete" umbrella.