[Dashboards] Improve Custom Dashboard Navigation

[Erikg346]

Describe the feature:
Currently, Links was introduced and it offers a better approach to using dashboard links instead of Markdown text within a dashboard.

I think Links are best when used for navigating within a dashboard. Like IAM with links to Overview, Users, Groups.
But, navigating between different unrelated dashboards, seems like it takes up space on the dashboard.

To maximize the dashboard real estate,
It would be great to improve the general Dashboards page:

OR
Perhaps a flyout panel to make it easier for a user to navigate between custom dashboards.
Similar to Elastic's Hamburger Menu:

Maybe just add "Custom Dashboards" under "Recently Viewed" where we can assign a static list of dashboards.

Describe a specific use case for the feature:
My team currently uses a navigation panel (links/markdown) to move between dashboards. This is because it allows users to navigate easily without having to search for a name or tag in Dashboards page. The problem is trying to maximize dashboard space. It would be great to use a flyout panel or make the Dashboards page more intuitive.

[elasticmachine]

Pinging @elastic/kibana-presentation (Team:Presentation)

[nickpeihl]

Hi @Erikg346. Thanks for your suggestions.

If I understand correctly, you would like a better way to navigate from a dashboard to another dashboard. And you are suggesting we allow users to "pin" dashboards to the Kibana navigation flyout? Would these "pinned" dashboards be per user or per cluster? I wonder if this issue is similar to yours?

Alternatively, have you tried using the Search bar to locate and navigate to other dashboards?

dashboard-navigation.mp4

[Erikg346]

Hey @nickpeihl, yes "pin" dashboards are a great way to describe what I would like. I would suppose it can be up to the Admin to set these pinned dashboards. In my use case, it doesn't need to be customized for every single user but mostly for each Space.

The issue you linked is similar but has been inactive for a couple of years now. Just to also add, tree navigation is what I believe is the best approach.

I think navigating through the search bar is great but we have seen many people forget what a dashboard is called and also dashboards can seem very hidden if they aren't sure what they are looking for. We need a way to showcase available dashboards for the user to navigate to.

The current way is using Links or Markdown:

or

[elasticmachine]

Pinging @elastic/appex-sharedux (Team:SharedUX)

[ThomThomson]

Reassigning this to the Shared UX team for now, because it could be a consideration as part of their Content Management initiative.

[Erikg346]

Hello,
is there an update on this?

[nickpeihl]

Hi @Erikg346. We've recently merged a feature that will allow users to "favorite" certain dashboards on the listing page. It looks like this feature should be available in the 8.16.0 release sometime later this year.

Note, favorited dashboards are not defined by any admin setting. Favorited dashboards are saved in the browser's local storage, so they are defined by the user.

[Erikg346]

@nickpeihl this is great news!