I’m looking for some sort of plugin that turns the comments on a particular thread (or perhaps in a particular category if that’s better) into a form submit, so users have to submit only in pre-made fields. Essentially, a Google Form plugin where instead of being able to freely comment on a thread they have to fill out a short form and it’ll populate in that structure in the thread. Does that exist? What would it be called, if so? Or how would one go about making this work? Thanks!
AI-generated summary
The discussion revolves around finding a plugin that turns comments on a thread into a form submission, where users have to fill out pre-made fields. Bri_Castellini is looking for a solution to enforce structure in certain threads.
Falco suggests using the Typeform onebox, but it only populates in the TypeForm admin area, not in the thread itself. Bri_Castellini is looking for a way to force structure in threads, making it easier to read and follow.
Falco mentions category Topic Templates, but it’s not an enforced way and only a suggestion. Bri_Castellini discovers that the base Discourse toolbox has a feature that allows auto-population of the composer, similar to what they’re looking for.
However, pfaffman and codinghorror clarify that this feature only exists on a category level, not on a thread level. Bri_Castellini confirms that there is no existing plugin for thread-level auto-population.
In a separate conversation, JackSnyder discusses issues with the Typeform onebox integration, and Falco mentions that automatic Typeform onebox is no longer supported.
Finally, Falco announces that a native form template feature is now available via https://meta.discourse.org/t/introducing-experimental-form-templates/278631?u=falco.
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In my opinion, the Typeform onebox is the best way.
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Create a form in Typeform
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Paste the form link in your new topic
Example: the link to https://templates.typeform.com/to/zvlr4L becomes:
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Would this populate in a particular thread? Or would it go to backend only? Like an excel sheet or something
Results would be available only in the TypeForm admin area.
Trying to parse Discourse posts into structured data will always be tricky, since Discourse is free form text.
Gotcha. Yeah what I’m looking for is a way to force structure for certain threads, partially to make the threads easier to read through but mostly to make it easy for people to FOLLOW structure (as opposed to them having to copy/paste and then reformat a written out structure).
We do have category Topic Templates, but that’s far from a enforced way, only a suggestion. I can see it working only on very technical audiences.
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https://meta.discourse.org/t/topic-templates
This one? I’m not sure I get it exactly after reading through…
Oh interesting. So I could build a form style template and they’d have to manually select it to use it, otherwise it would just be a regular comment? Does that exist in the base Discourse toolbox?
Start a new post here, and select Marketplace. You’ll then see how it auto-populates the composer.
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Oh snap that’s perfect. How do I install/set that up, exactly? Just in basic discourse admin?
NVM, found it! Is there an option or plugin that allows this in particular threads, or just on a category level? And does it populate in each thread or just new unique posts? What I’m looking for is for that to show up in the comments on a thread versus a new thread itself.
Just the category level. There is the canned-replies plugin, but it works only for admins.
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So basically there is no existing plugin for thread-level auto-population?
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No such feature exists, no.
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That’s what I was looking for. Thanks!
Hi Falco, thanks for integrating Typeform onebox. It works, but doesn’t render the same way it renders for me. It renders as a square box that opens a new window instead of how your works as an embed.
What should I be doing right?
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Yes, typeform renders a bit differently now, it oneboxes. Not sure if we should have explicit support here, or if an <iframe> domain could be whitelisted, or what @falco
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Yeah unfortunately we had to give up on automatic typeform onebox 
You can still allow the typeform URL in the iframe setting, and then paste the iframe code in a post.
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We now have it natively via Introducing Form Templates
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