Sometimes, if we end with a sidebar with a large amount of items, it would be useful to visually separate them in groups taking into account their context. In this situation, the divider order-item property becomes a handy feature.
Since the beginning it is possible to assign the href of a sidebar item specificing this property. This property is useful if one wants to go to a dashboard or open an external website when clicking on sidebar items. But since some time, it is also possible to execute a Home Assistant Service (renamed recently to Actions) if we specify the correct action in the on_click proprty of a sidebar item.
Since some time already, it is possible to add templates to the hide property of the order items. This means that it is possible to show or hide items when the state of an entity changes.
It is possible to add multiple matchers to an exception (user, not_decice, is_admin, etc). By default if at least one of the matchers matches, the exeeption will be picked, that is to say, the conditions of the matchers are by default OR conditions. But it is possible to change this behaviour.
When you are going to create a configuration for a user, one possible approach is to start hiding the items that this user doesn't need. But what happens when we want to hide everything and just display a few items for that user? In would be a hassle to write item by item with a hide property. It is better if we hide everything and just show what we want visible.
It is possible to change Custom Sidebar options when navigating through Home Assistant panels. You can dinamically change all the options that accept a template to react to changes in the Home Assistant URL.
If you are in a desktop device, you can go to your settings and activate a switch for Always hide the sidebar, so you will have the sidebar automatically hidden as in a mobile device. But if you are in a small-screen device, there is no Always show the sidebar option.
Home Assistant has a native feature to change the order of sidebar items or hide them. But this feature should not be used together with Custom Sidebar if you are using a custom order or hiding/showing items. So, in case that you are doing this you should disable this functionality.