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Currently, if there are no questions with active bounty on a site, the site's homepage and question lists do not have the "featured" tab at all:

no featured tab

However, navigating directly to the URL of the featured tab results in this:

navigating directly showing featured tab

I find it rather helpful and good, and it encourage users to use the bounty system, so my suggestion is to always show the featured tab, even when there are 0 questions with bounties:

mockup of featured tab with 0 questions

Keep in mind, the number of questions with bounty always show in the "featured" tab already:

featured tab with number of questions having bounty

But in blue, so marking it red when there are no questions should make it clear we should not expect it to list any questions.

This will also be consistent with other elements that are always visible even when they can't be acted upon, e.g. edit link when post can't be edited, vote buttons on own posts, etc.

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  • I'm warming to your idea (even with my answer outlining a disagreement) tho I think red colour isn't right as it's generally an indication of a problem or warning.
    – James
    Commented Jun 24, 2018 at 12:17
  • @James thanks. As for red color, well, it is a warning of some sort: "there are no bounties, time to have some!". :)
    – Shadow Wizard
    Commented Jun 24, 2018 at 12:31
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    @ShadowWizard You could always go with yellow. ;)
    – Jason Bassford
    Commented Jun 24, 2018 at 16:42

1 Answer 1

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I find it rather helpful and good...always show the featured tab even when there are 0 questions with bounties

Is it really "helpful and good" to create expectations and provide a link to what would be specific content, only to find having clicked said link that there's absolutely nothing there?

Even it being disabled carries UX issues of it not being clear why clicking things does nothing.

and it encourage users to use the bounty system

Surely clicking a button to find an empty page is going to have the opposite effect, and they're less likely to click it again? Whereas not seeing the button when there's no content, and then when they do it being there and not before might raise intrigue and so they click it - and no dissatisfaction of having no content to peruse.

Without clear indication that there's nothing to see once they click it, what will make them click it? A gamble now and then to see if something exists? This is bad UX IMO.

I see the red "0" is suggested, but what about consistency on this and other tabs? Does this mean we need to always have a number on the "featured" tab when there are questions, showing the total number? Then what colour is it? Or is it only visible when there are "0" featured questions and so not really an indication of total questions but just showing there are none, which the button not being visible already represents.

Also for consistency, do we add numbers to other tabs? When there are values and when it'll be "0"? What colour?

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    Disagree. The "0" is red on purpose, to make it clear there are no questions with active bounty at the moment, and yes I believe this will encourage bounties since it will let people know such thing even exists. The "start bounty" link on question page is rather small and easily missed, on small sites with few bounties, there often won't be any featured tab, so I assume many users, even long time, are not even aware such thing is possible. Maybe I can clarify this in the question?
    – Shadow Wizard
    Commented Jun 24, 2018 at 11:25
  • @ShadowWizard I've edited my post :)
    – James
    Commented Jun 24, 2018 at 11:49
  • There is already always a number in the "featured" tab, when it is visible, with number of questions with active bounty, so not sure I understand your edit... (this is the only tab showing a number, always been like that.)
    – Shadow Wizard
    Commented Jun 24, 2018 at 11:51
  • I've edited the question, maybe there was some kind of misunderstanding.
    – Shadow Wizard
    Commented Jun 24, 2018 at 12:11
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    Well I'll leave this here anyway as a means to represent votes against the idea. These things often touch upon personal preferences so is hard to consider what would be good for the site in general.
    – James
    Commented Jun 24, 2018 at 12:15

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