December 2019 - The Updated "Cookie Crumb" Branch Navigation Method

Within our system, there are two methods for users to navigate between branches they have access to:

1. The Switch Branches button

2. The "Cookie Crumb" navigator (named after the way it would lead you down the trail)

Recent Updates

Prior to release 8.34.2 on Friday the 13th of December, 2019, it was known that users were finding it difficult to use the Cookie Crumb method to navigate to certain branches. To explain this, we will be using an example from a testing/demonstration account below.

This user has access to the following branches:

As you can see in the above, the user has access to all of the child branches but none of the parent branches.

If the user was trying to use the cookie crumb method to switch between branch A or branch B, the user wouldn't have a problem doing so as they would automatically be focused on the sub-branches of ENAB-2886 Root Parent once they logged in.  The user would only need to click on the right-most drop down in the trail to see the option of switching between A and B as with the above screenshot.

But what if the user wanted to get to Branch C through ENAB-2886 Sub-Parent?

If that were the case, they wouldn't be able to do so using the cookie crumb method as the second level drop-down wouldn't show ENAB-2886 Sub-Parent (the user has no explicit access granted to this parent branch) and the user would need to be relegated to using the first method (the Switch Branches button) in order to get to Branch C.

For clients or users who weren't aware of the first method, they would then likely get in touch with Client Experience and ask why they can't use the cookie crumb method to get to Branch C and be told about the first method.

This problem is usually then exacerbated by the size of our various clients and the complexity of their organisational structures and various branch permissions per user.

Moving forward, with the release of the updated functionality, the cookie crumb method has been simplified:

In the above scenario, if your user only has access to the sub-branches, access in the cookie crumb method will be compiled into the drop-down closest to the left.

Clicking on any of the buttons will by-pass the parent branch that the user doesn't have access to and navigate the user straight to the branch that they do have access to.

If the user does have access to the parent branch, the selection will be pushed one to the right.

This should now fully allow users to navigate to all branches that they have explicitly allocated access to.