We believe that the Forum structure is optimal for control over visibility, organization, and usability. It would be nice if Solutions followed the same structure. However, visibility should be controlled at each level, otherwise you can have empty areas.
Forums
Category
This is separated by a header but the visibility cannot be controlled. Unfortunately, if you have many forums within a Category only visible to Agents, end-users would see the header but nothing in it. It would be nice to be able to control visibility at the Category level too.
Forum
These are typed and allow for visibility control. This is perfect.
Topic
These are topics within a Forum, but they cannot be controlled for visibility. This is not such a big deal because you can store private Topics in a private Forum and move it when appropriate.
Solutions
Category
These have very little to offer except the grouping of Folders. It would be nice to have visibility control here. Also, I believe these should also be treated like Categories in Forums, broken out by separate headers. This is how Zendesk allows you to group things.
Folder
Folders allow for the grouping of many solutions and there is visibility control. This is great. However, I believe that these "folders" could be more like a Forum with a logo, even one that could be uploaded, or be selected from a list of premade ones. Icons help make the UI a bit comforting and users can choose to not have one at all. It already has a count, which is great.
Solution
Solutions are hidden deep within the UI and require users to actually navigate to folders first. It would be great if they were listed just like Topics in a forum, with the ability to Lock and Stick. This allows popular solutions to be quickly visible, instead of being hidden inside a Folder.
SUMMARY
Forums have a great structure: Category, Forum, Topic, but I believe that Solutions can get a similar look and structure as well. Visibility control would be great at the first two levels.
This is an awesome product! Zendesk, watch out!
