New features in 2.8.0.beta3
User-selectable avatar flair
Users in multiple groups can now select the avatar flair they wish to display from their preferences, rather than relying on automatic flair assigned based on their primary group. Avatar flair supports both font awesome icons as well as custom images.
Add last visit indication to topic view page
When opening a topic you have already started reading, Discourse will automatically load the topic at the first unread post so you can keep reading. Now, Discourse also displays an indicator of where your last visit was, so you can safely scroll up or down without losing your place.
Use native file picker
When uploading a file to the composer, Discourse will now use the native file picker instead of first displaying a custom modal. Discourse also passes along the supported file extensions to the operating system so users donāt have to think about what is allowed. In addition to the upload button, users can continue to copy/paste and drag/drop files to upload them in the composer.
API key scope for editing posts
When creating an API key, scopes can be applied to restrict the actions allowed with each key, improving security by limiting access should the key be compromised. A posts edit scope has been added to allow an API key to edit posts the API key owner has access to edit.
Improve process for adding users to a group
The Add Members button on the Group page has been split into āAdd Usersā and āInviteā. Existing users on the site can be added to the group by username or email using the Add Users modal (first image). New users can be invited to join the Discourse site and added to the group upon joining via the āInviteā modal (second image).
Client side image optimization
When users add an image to their post, Discourse attempts to compress the image if it is larger than the allowed size. This compression happened on the server, meaning the large image file needed to be uploaded first. For users with slow or limited bandwidth, this can take a lengthy period of time, and impact their data usage limits.
Sites can now enable the composer_media_optimization_image_enabled site setting to compress the image on the userās device - computer, phone, or tablet - before it is uploaded.
See more on our blog:
Penalty history improvements
As sites grow in size, it is no longer possible for moderators to know every userās history as is possible in newer/smaller communities. Weāve made some improvements to assist moderators in their jobs.
- Add a history count when applying penalties to give moderators context to the user they are penalizing.
- Add a site setting that designates default penalty values in hours.
Silence/suspend modals will auto-fill in the default values, but otherwise will still allow moderators to pick and overwrite values as normal.
First silence/suspend: first value. Second silence/suspend: second value. etc.
Accessibility improvements
- Adjust heading rules on topic lists
- Donāt mark multiple form labels as applying to the same element
- Add labels where needed
Additional features
This beta has so many new features we canāt detail them all. Below are some additional features of note. You can find the full list of new features in the following post.
- Setting to allow moderators to change post ownership
- Make invites work with existing users
- Warn if invited user cannot see topic
- Add staff action logs for watched words
- Add multiselect user custom field
- Add slow_mode_prevents_editing setting.
- Staff can receive pending user reminders more frequently.
- Accept the flag modal on CTRL + ENTER and CMD + ENTER
- Upload to s3 in parallel to speed up backup restores
- Blocking is optional when deleting a user from the review queue.
- Add a messages view for all official warnings of a user
- Add group filter to user directory