Discourse Assign

[Discourse]

	Summary	Discourse Assign provides the ability to assign topics and individual posts (both private and public) to a user or group.
	Install Guide	This plugin is bundled with Discourse core. There is no need to install the plugin separately.

As this is an official plugin maintained by the Discourse team, Support, Bug, UX, and Feature requests can be made in the respective categories here on Meta, and tagged with the appropriate plugin tag. Click on a link below to get one started.

 Support  Bug  UX  Feature

Features

Discourse Assign adds a “tag like” annotation on the topic list and topic header with the username of the assigned user.

It allows you to assign topics to users and list all of the assigned topics.

Also, user groups can be assigned to the topic. In that case, each group member will receive a notification. In group Interaction configuration, you can specify Who can assign this group. By default, is it set to nobody.

In addition to assign to specific topic, individual post can be assigned as well. This option is hidden under “…” (show more) post toolbar. When a post is assigned, information about that is included in the topic title. Also, first post contain link to assigned post.

Assignments can also (optionally) be associated with customizable statuses, and will track changes to their statuses in small_action posts.

Configuration

Site Settings

• assigns by staff mention if you would like mentions by a staff member of another staff member to assign a topic select this

• unassign creates tracking post: out of the box when you unassign a topic a post is created in the stream to keep track of the fact it was unassigned, disable to remove the tracking post

• assigns public : out of the box all assignments are hidden from non-staff, if you want non-staff to be able to see who owns which topic, enable this setting.

• assign self regex if you would like to use a magic phrase to assign stuff to yourself add a regex here

• assign other regex if you would like to restrict it so only mentions with a particular phrase are assigned to others add something here

• unassign on close if a topic is closed it will automatically be silently unassigned

• unassign on group archive when a message is archived unassign it, once it moves back to inbox reassign it.

• reassign on open When a topic is opened reassign previously assigned users/groups

• assigns user url path template to path that is used as a hyperlink for any user assigned tags.

• assign mailer When to send notification email for assignments

• remind assigns frequency` Frequency for reminding users about assigned topics.

• max assigned topics Maximum number of topics that can be assigned to a user.

• assign allowed on groups controls the list of groups you can assign to. When a topic is assigned to a group it shows up in the individual assign list for all group members. They are notified when this assignment happens.

• enable assign status Add a customizable status field to every assignment.

• assign statuses is a list of statuses available to each assignment. The first status is the default status applied to every new assignment.

Listing assigned topics

There are 2 ways of viewing assigned topics,

• In topic list format:

  • https://sitename.com/latest?assigned=username to view all assigned topics for a user
  • https://sitename.com/latest?assigned=* to view all assigned topics for all users
  • https://sitename.com/latest?assigned=me to view all assigned to current user
  • https://sitename.com/latest?assigned=nobody to view all unassigned

• The user page activity there is an extra assigned tab visible to staff on activity and messages tabs

CHANGELOG

TODO

• Keyboard shortcuts

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Thank you to McNeel for sponsoring this work!

Last edited by @tobiaseigen 2025-07-16T20:52:51Z

Check document

Perform check on document:

[kuba-orlik]

@sam

When a topic is assigned to a group it shows up in the individual assign list for all group members. They are notified when this assignment happens.

This does not seem to work as of now. If I’m a part of group A and someone assigns group A to a topic, it doesn’t show up for me when I visit /latest?assigned=me.

[maiki]

Hi Kuba.

@kuba-orlik

/latest?assigned=me

That is a filter on the latest page. The mentioned “individual assign list” is at /my/activity/assigned.

[kuba-orlik]

Thanks! Is there a specific reason why those two filters behave differently?

[Ivan_Rapekas]

Is any way to configure the time of recurred notifications?

UPD: When a topic assigned to Group, users in Group do not receive email notifications. Is it correct? I expected users get an email + recurring emails (every day, every week) like single assignee.

[carlito (Carlito Nueno)]

Sorry if this was already mentioned (I wasn’t able to find this).

Can non-staff members use this plugin to assign? I wasn’t able to get this plugin working even if the user is moderator. The user has to be admin.

My use case: Team lead (non-staff/non-admin) writes a topic and assigns this to a team member (TL0-3 user). The team lead is not necessary the site admin or staff for Discourse forum because we have many team leads.

It would be helpful even if I can make Team lead a moderator and get this plugin working.

Thanks and appreciate it!

[Jagster (Jakke Lehtonen)]

Wouldn’t setting assign allowed on groups do that?

[carlito (Carlito Nueno)]

Hi @Jagster,

I have set assign allowed on groups to everyone

For example this user’s permissions are:

But this user is not able to see the assign button

[Moin]

Sometimes “everyone” doesn’t work. Have you tried trust_level_0 instead?

[HamMan2118]

Just a quick note - the Assign button will appear as it’s own option in topics/posts and won’t be under the menu

I just tested it on my end on a TL3 account set under the following conditions and got these results:

TL3 user with everyone permission

Same issue as @carlito, the option does not come up.

TL3 user with trust_level_0 permission

This works as intended.

So…with this being said, you’d need to set trust_level_0 as @Moin suggested. I think it would be expected to work otherwise if you selected everyone, so maybe this is a bug?

[carlito (Carlito Nueno)]

@Moin and @HamMan2118

Awesome, that worked!

Thank you both!

[krystal (Krystal S)]

How can I find and edit the email template that is sent out when someone is assigned? It doesn’t exist along with the other email templates?

[Moin]

This one?

You can find it at Admin > Site texts. I searched for assign_mailer, which returns the title (assign_mailer.subject_template) and the body text (assign_mailer.text_body_template).

[krystal (Krystal S)]

Yes that’s it, thanks!!

[tknospdr (David Muszynski)]

Where in the UI is the status exposed?

I see who a topic is assigned to, but I don’t see any way to tell what it’s current status is.

[NateDhaliwal]

@tknospdr Have you seen this part?

@Discourse

Assignments can also (optionally) be associated with customizable statuses, and will track changes to their statuses in small_action posts.

[tknospdr (David Muszynski)]

Yes, but that only shows up once you make a change. There’s no visual indication that a status was assigned at all, until you change it from X to Y.

[NateDhaliwal]

You can see the current status if you go to the ‘Edit Assignment’ tab, below the ‘Assign’ button.

[tknospdr (David Muszynski)]

You mean “Edit assignments” that is hidden behind the button that says ‘Unassign…’

If I don’t want to unassign it, I’d hesitate to click on that button right?

1. That’s unintuitive.
2. Are you saying that you don’t think a visual cue to let you know what the assigned status of a topic is right out in the open is a good idea?

I just can’t imagine it’s a tall order code wise, and it just makes sense to have it out in the open.