Diary feature for Discourse

Contribute Feature
2

I don’t think you can enforce the rules you’re describing completely out of the box. (There may be a plugin that does more of what you want… not sure).

But even without the feature or plugin, I think it’s achievable:

  1. Create a Diary category and in the “about” topic, document the rules:
    • To create a diary for yourself, create a new topic in this category, with this naming convention:
      First Last’s Diary - Fancy Title, for example:
      Abiodun Olumide Daniels’s Diary - Crazy Ideas That Just Might Work (Or Not)
    • In the original post, share a short summary of what you plan to log in you diary.
    • When you want to update it, just write a new post!
  2. Follow diaries that you are interested in
    • Use the built-in subscription features to get updates when your favorite authors post updates
  3. Don’t reply to others in their topics!
    • There’s not feature to prevent you from replying to others, but please don’t replies will be flagged and removed. Repeat offenders will be suspended from the forum.
    • You may reply as a new topic in any other category or quote posts in other topics if you wish to discuss anyone’s diary posts.
  4. Help us enforce these rules!
    • If you see folks replying to others’ diary posts, please flag them. Thanks!

If you really run into problems with people not following the rules you could make this adjustment:

  1. Create a group like @diary-posters and only grant access to that group to Create/Reply/See
  2. Require folks to join that group to do step (1) above.
  3. Remove people from the group if they reply to others (thereby also removing their privilege to post to their own diary).

It’s not perfect, but I bet it’d work.

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