Over the past few months, we’ve seen Discourse implement improvements and new features in the admin panel. Like all major changes, it has drawn both positive and negative feedback.
I think we all appreciate the UI/UX of the new interface, and if we find any discrepancies, it’s because we use our forums in different ways.
I’m about to relaunch my community, and as I analyze the various options available in my admin panel, I realize I need a “sub-admin” who should have access to specific features — but not to the full range offered by /admin.
Moderators and TL3/TL4 handles content and the community, the tools this “sub-admin” would have available are broader and get impact on the internal management of Discourse.
This list is a briefly draft and it is not exhaustive. It would give a general idea of what it needs to be discussed.
Allowed sub-admin permissions:
- Access to sentiment/emotion models.
- Update translations (texts) for custom translations that fits better with the community slang.
- Users, groups, badges, upcoming features.
- Permalinks, special words, embeds.
- Statistics, moderation, review, and other features that wouldn’t harm the site if handled by a trusted sub-admin.
- Plugin configuration (perhaps selectable from a list to avoid the most sensitive ones).
Permissions NOT granted to the “sub-admin”:
- Access to all administration options.
- Updating the Discourse instance.
- Adding or removing theme components.
- Access to specific settings related to emails, security, user login, etc.
- Access to API keys, webhooks, and any sensitive site information.
This new scoped permission into the admin section should be linked to two separate administration panels, based on the functions each administrator group provides.
So we would have, on one hand (i) a technical dashboard, and on the other (ii) a functional dashboard, applicable to PMs, CMs, and similar roles in different organizations, at their discretion.
The current modular design of the admin panel would allow main administrators to choose between the different options, in case they also want to stay up to date on what is happening at the functional level in community management.
I know this might take time, and it may not be something the team wants to address right away, but I think it would be great to start discussing this with the Meta community so they can read our thoughts on the matter.
In my particular case, in a niche community that lacks an organizational structure (beyond what arises naturally), I am currently unable to grant certain access privileges because handing over the entire admin panel would not be beneficial for what we do at this time.
This literally keeps me tied to all of Discourse’s management, even though I could delegate a large part of the tasks to the naturally formed team —since they’re people I trust— but they don’t yet have the necessary experience for me to simply delegate or allow access to everything.
Thoughts?