Here’s a regular thing that happens to me:
- I see a notification indicator on the left navigation
- I click through to the notification screen
- I notice I have already seen the notifications at the top
- I scroll around, trying to figure out what’s actually new
- Most of the time I find something
- I’m never sure I’ve seen everything new
Grouping notifications by type is confusing, since I can never really be sure I’ve acknowledged everything. Either of these two different approaches would be better for me:
A. Don’t group anything. Just a steady, chronological stream of likes, new patrons, dropped patrons, thread comments.
B. Group, but keep unseen and seen notifications separate. Never group them. So if I have 30 post comments, but only 3 of them are new, I’d see two items: the 3 new posts grouped, and the 27 old ones grouped.