Discourse AI - Ask Discourse

Documentation Site Management
, ,
1

:bookmark: This guide explains how to enable and use Ask Discourse.

:person_raising_hand: Required user level: Administrator

ask.discourse.com houses our AI agent that can search through our documentation and answer many common questions or issues related to Discourse.

Features

:information_source: Features will vary depending on whether Ask Discourse is accessed via chat or from the site. On the site Ask Discourse, it uses PM to start a conversation with the agent, the same experience as AI bot.

  • Accessible via chat or by visiting ask.discourse.com
  • AI agent searches and reads through Meta topics and documentation
  • Selectable New Question, pre-set questions or type any question
  • Recent conversations
  • View all questions asked
  • Change account settings
  • Change fonts and appearance
  • Copyable responses
  • Like or dislike responses
  • Invite users to join the conversation
  • Log-in via Meta user profile

Enabling Ask Discourse

Anyone can visit ask.discourse.com for help. No additional configuration is needed.

Access via chat

:warning: When enabled only admins and moderators will have access to chat with the agent.

On Discourse-hosted sites, the Ask Discourse chat bot is automatically enabled for trial sites. When enabled, the bot will automatically appear in staff members’ chat as discourse_ai (Discourse Helper Bot). The only prerequisite is that chat is enabled on the site.

  1. Ensure chat is enabled on the site (navigate to /admin/plugins and check Chat enabled)
  2. The bot will automatically start a chat conversation with recently active staff members
  3. You can also start a new conversation with discourse_ai via chat

While this feature uses elements of Discourse AI, you do not need to install and enable the plugin.

Technical FAQ

Why do I see discourse ai as an admin user on my site?

  • Enabling access to Ask Discourse via chat requires the AI agent to have admin access. It does not act on its own and is not looking through your site content.

How does Ask Discourse work?

  • The AI agent uses tool calls to read and search through site settings, Meta topics, and documentation to answer questions to the best of its knowledge.

Are there plans to expand its availability?

  • Currently, we are experimenting with Ask Discourse. In the future, we may make it default accessible on all sites or entirely change the way users interact with it.

Caveats

  • Generative AI can make mistakes, please flag them to help improve our engine. All content on this site is reviewed regularly by Discourse staff.
12 Likes
Does Meta Discourse Support Answering Questions via an AI Chat Widget?
Feedback for Ask Discourse
2

This resource looks useful - as always with LLMs, it answers clearly and with confidence. I’m not sure how I might tell if it gave me bad information.

I notice the Support & Feedback link (results from clicking my profile at top left) goes to a now-dead link here:
https://meta.discourse.org/t/help-us-test-ask-discourse-com/324441

2 Likes
3

For the time being, we’ve taken this portion down to access via What’s New, to fix some issues. It will be back again soon In the future!

1 Like
7

Hey @Ed_S, we’ve now updated the link, it should redirect to a public topic: Feedback for Ask Discourse

1 Like