Wondering about how your App, Website, and Category settings work together? We're happy to help!
Each app or website in Circle belongs to a corresponding Category. (For example, Facebook belongs to the Social Media Category.) An app or website can be set to Allowed, Not Allowed, or Unmanaged. A Category can also be set to these Filter settings. This article explains what happens when these settings are in conflict, and which will win out.
App or Website Filters Take Priority
The app or website filter settings you set (Allowed, Not Allowed, Unmanaged) always take priority over a Category setting. For an example, see below:
If the Category Filter and app or website Filter conflict, the app or website Filter will win out.
For example, let's say you've set the Videos Category to Not Allowed, and YouTube is set as Allowed. The YouTube setting will take priority here and is available while all other sites and apps in the video category will be blocked.
What about Custom Filters?
Be careful while setting up Custom Filters as these will also take precedence over category level filtering. For example, you can set google.com to Unmanaged and it should always be available even if Science and Technology as a category is set to Not Allowed. You may need to set multiple Custom Filters up for an app or website to managed the way you want, since often an app or website is using multiple resources to load.
Why Do Apps or Websites Take Priority?
App or website Filters are designed to be more granular, while Category Filters cast a wide net. You might want to block Social Media in general, for example, but allow Facebook. The more granular app or websites are the ones that win out if there is a disagreement.
Additional Apps or Websites and Categories
There is a slight twist when it comes to additional apps like Xbox Live, Spotify, etc. that do not appear in the default app or website list. When it comes to these apps or websites, they do not exist as separate from Categories until they are added to the Profile from History or Usage. You can read about adding additional apps or websites to the Filter screen here.
In the example above, Spotify will not be accessible, as it is categorized as a Music site. However, if the steps are followed in this linked article to add Spotify as an Additional App or Website, and it is set as Allowed after adding it to the Profile from History or Usage, it will be accessible and will function normally.