Ideas and questions on using discourse

Discussion and Planning
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Starting this topic to collect and discuss ideas on how to effectively use discourse.

I just introduced this “discussion and planning” category and some descriptions of each category, hope it’s useful.

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Here are some questions I would like to explore:

  • how to hide this category/bookmark menu: SOLVED → in customize - themes - css

  • maybe it would calm down the discourse start page if we get rid of the “latest topics” column and just see the categories SOLVED - in settings - desktop style

  • how do we add a welcome text at the very top, editing https://trustinplay.edgeryders.eu/t/ideas-on-using-discourse/92 doesn’t seem to do anything SOLVED via custom theming

  • how do we add graphics and links to the header of the trust in play discourse? SOLVED via theme editing

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  • is it possible to get rid of the “new topic” button on the first page (only have it appear inside a category) SOLVED - in settings- customize - theme - css
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Can we hide the pinned topics with the category descriptions for regular users? SOLVED “unlisted topics”

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I’ve disabled the badge system - I think it’s a bit annoying gamification - if someone really likes it happy to turn it back on :slight_smile:

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Great that you’re finding your way around Discourse already :slight_smile: Small hints:

As a side effect, this means that regular users cannot see the full category descriptions anywhere. (The categories on the frontpage will show only teasers of the descriptions, either below the category name for top-level categories or on-hover for sub-level categories.)

As a solution we extended Discourse so that you can show the full category description (with a “Show more” to unfold) on category pages, like here. This will / should also work in your Discourse installation already. Instructions are here.

Yes, it’s quite annoying, but I think mostly because it’s overdoing it in the default configuration (“badge inflation”, which makes them quite worthless). But you can configure in detail what actions yield badges and when, see “☰ → Admin → Badges” (only visible when the badge system is enabled).

Oh, and: You probably want to set logo and favicon of the site. That is possible here. And let me know when your domain is ready so we can make this site available under an own domain for you.

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I would have kept this as it creates the feel of someone entering a forum that is populated, active and with goodies provided straight up.
I am for featured content of any sorts, it’s just a totally different and better experience imho.

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Thanks, super useful!

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I understand it from the perspective of the power user. As a new user I was always super overwhelmed and confused by it. For active users you can still always get top posts from the menu. I suggest we collect feedback from the others. Another option is to make the recent post thing smaller and less noisy visually… Or to make a link to that view in the welcome text.

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As a compromise, I gave the categories a bit more space and reduced the number of top topics - maybe this is the right balance…

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I have another question: how do I change text elements in the interface? Is there an easy way to do this? Will look into it too and update here when I find a way… solved: customize → text … it’s really a very easily customizable platform, cool!

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Hi @matthias - it would be great to have community.trustinplay.eu point to this discourse and set that up until the end of the week. I have access to the domain provider - should I just set up a subdomain and point the dns records somewhere? Or do we need to move the installation somewhere? let me know what the steps are - you can also email me on sebastianquack@gmail.com about this - thanks!

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Moving a Discourse installation is not easy, and hosting is included in your contract for the Discourse setup. So yes, just create community.trustinplay.eu and point the DNS records as follows:

A       46.163.78.192
AAAA    2a01:488:66:1000:2ea3:4ec0:0:1

Let me know when that is done. We’ll do the necessary steps on our side after that.

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Hi Matthias, great - ok I’ve pointed the subdomain as advised. Might take some time to propagate… (and hope it worked)

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We have finished the move to the new domain now. (But we are keeping trustinplay.edgeryders.eu as a forwarder for a few months.)

And once you have a Discourse logo, please send it to me so we can integrate it into the top-right “Communities” menu as well.

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Awesome, thank you. Will send logo tomorrow, and update the header here in the next days.

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Hi Matthias, I’ve added logos to the site assets thingy!

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