Users in Discourse can appear to have multiple trust levels (e.g., TL0 and TL1) because trust levels are cumulative milestones—not mutually exclusive states. sjmscott was confused by this, thinking TL0 should disappear once TL1 is reached. steko clarified that TL1 includes all TL0 permissions and more, and pointed to /admin/users/list/newuser to view TL0 users. tobiaseigen noted this design is useful but confusing for non-technical users, and referenced a feature request to display only the highest badge. Mittineague explained that badges signify “when you reach” a level—not “when you are” at it—making them more like achievements; TL3 can even be revoked if not maintained. The system’s logic is functional but can mislead newcomers who expect a single, current level display.
I am confused that I have some people at two trust levels:
trust_level_0, trust_level_1
It seems like once you move to level 1, level 0 should go away. . . . or am I missing something?
edit: is it possible to search for trust_level_0, but not trust_level_1?
I have 3 people that fall into this category. I want to move all of my current users to level 1
To reply your first question: this is correct. Users at TL0 have certain permissions, while users at TL1 have all the permissions of TL0 plus some more. And so on for further trust levels.
For your second question: you should be able to see a list of users at TL0 at /admin/users/list/newuser (this is also accessible from the main admin dashboard in the “Users by trust level” table).
This is a structural oddity of discourse that took me a while to get a handle on as well, but I have come to appreciate it with time. It’s a great feature.
That said, it’s unnecessarily confusing for community members who don’t really care about the internal workings of discourse, so I think it’s a good idea to shield them from it. There is an open Contribute > Feature request to only show one trust level badge, which would go a long way to doing that.
What the Trust Level badges signify is available.
If you go to the various Trust Level badges you can see
This badge is granted when you reach trust level …
That is, “when you reach” and not “when you are”
In other words, the granting of Trust Levels are more like “milestones” than “current level”, though the current level is the highest reached and Trust Level 3 should probably say “reach and maintain” as it can be un-granted.
In explaining that, I see it can be a bit confusing, can’t it?