Are there other workarounds to not having category moderation such as multiple instances of the board?

feature
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#1

Hey there,
I was sad to see that I didn’t realize there were no category-specific permissions for moderation until after I got everything all set up and what not but I really like the forum in general and am trying to find some sort of way to work around this. I see that there is a tag system, is are there anyways to have custom permission based on the tags applied to threads or anything of the like?

Essentially the main goal is Developer-A has Category-A, Dev-B has Cat-B, Both Dev-A and Dev-B can see each other’s categories, post on them see the rest of the forum as normal users would, but Dev-A can edit posts, make stickies, delete things, etc only in Cat-A, and same for Dev-B and Cat-B.

I realize that this is not currently possible neither with the trust levels or Moderation permissions, but is there any sort of other workarounds to restrict editing of anything except for the category you are assigned? Even if it is simply not showing the edit or delete functionality in other categories besides your own based on user-specific setting, or group membership.

If still, that is not possible, what kind of requirements are there of setting up more than one board within the docker image, even if it just uses the same database, perhaps with a different prefix or something? Instead of restricting by category, it could just be another small forum for a development team. I could make an admin account on each board, then give out moderator permission to each team on their board and they could it up how they wish. I would imagine once docker and the DB are up and running, is it crazy to assume that another instance of the site could just function from a subdomain independently?

I know it is not comparing apples to apples, but the last forum I used was using tags to allow or disallow edits, a group is assigned to a tag, if the tag is a parent and they have permissions for the parent, then anything under there they can do with as they see fit, is there any modifications available to Discourse along those lines?

I definitely appreciate any insight anyone has into this, especially information on running multiple instances if you have any experience with its performance and the steps involved in accomplishing it.

Thanks!

Cross discourse category hosting?
#2

You can use Multisite configuration with Docker to run multiple instances.

1 Like
#3

Is there any rough (very rough, as in it uses 10% more than standard, to it uses 50% of standard is fine as long as anyone has at least used it) estimate of what % increase of resources another instance requires, I would imagine once the overall setup is there its not a crazy amount more.

#4

It’s not much more. It might work with a 2gb server, though I’m using 4gb.

You can also use one site as the SSO master and have the others authenticate against it.

If you can trust moderators to moderate one category, can you not trust them not to moderate the others?

#5

My site is going to be for developers of completely different teams. Some of which may be in competition with each other. Each category would be their own section for their team. There is no need or want for anyone to do any editing or moderation outside of their own section. I would handle the global moderation. Do I expect there to ever be any issues? No. Could there be? I hope not, but yes, there could be. Why risk it if I don’t have to? If each team has their own permissions and they can support their users within their own confines, then everything is good.

As far as running multiple instances. In your best estimate, how many instances could possibly be run on say, a 4gb machine, or perhaps an 8?

2 Likes
#6

Given that you don’t have issues with traffic, you could definitely do eight. I think that I have more than that.

#7

I meant how many do you think I could manage to run with 8gb of ram, but it is good to know that I could at least do 8 to start out with. I currently have 4gb in my VPC How do you have it setup? I saw people link and talk about separate containers, is that how you went about it?

Ideally I could just have one board and the categories locked down, but unfortunately, it just doesn’t seem like that is going to work. How would the SSO going back to the main DB handle permissions of the local instance? Would that not end up having the same issues just across multiple boards now instead of one? If someone is made a mod of one board, does the SSO then carry over to other boards because it is centralized or are mod / admin permissions localized just to the board in which they are assigned?

Does doing it that way let you centrally manage the users? Say user A is using board B, but its authenticating through board A, does cutting them off from board A also cut them off from board B, or does B have its own settings in which they could still get on?

#8

Each board would have separate admins and all on. Sso would just mean that they don’t have to have multiple passwords and that logging in to one site would log you in to all.

Yes. I have separate data and web containers.

The offer possibility is that you don’t need separate moderators. It sounds like you’ll have a set of people who know each other. Do you anticipate having many messages that will need I be deleted because people are behaving badly? Perhaps you can just lock down the category and everyone will behave

#9

It is not so much deleting things, but possibly, and occasionally. As I said, the board is for developers to be able to communicate with their users. Each developer / development team creates a different app or suite. Most of them do not know each other, but they all make plugins and what not for the same parent application, that is the only thing that ties everyone together. Which is why its important that the users can view and post in all categories, because I alone own 30-40 different plugins, so I would be all over the board. I want the dev to be able to create and manage their own FAQ, be able to sticky it at the top of their own section, be able to post tutorial videos, and also manage their own users posts if need be within their category. Each category would essentially act as their own mini forum that they manage, and each dev would be responsible for their section only.

I am paying for the hosting, doing all the setup and what not to support the developers because I want to, and I would hate to have them migrate over only to have some one else come in to their section and goof something up because they had more permission than they needed. Not one of these devs are meant to moderate the forum as a whole, because the forum as a whole is nothing but smaller subforums for each dev and their software and their users. Think of a category as its own forum, or an apartment in an overall building. You don’t want someone else to just come in to your apartment. You want a set of keys and you just do your thing in your apartment. Sure, every one of your neighbors seems like a good person, but you never know. Then here is a superintendent in case of an emergency, which would be me.

That being said, I will have to see about trying to do multi-instance and then I can just provide each dev / team their own whole forum. Unfortunately though, if that is the case, it might be better off to just find a different lighter weight forum system. I liked this one because of all the other features as well, but all of that other stuff make it pretty beefy requirement wise with all of the docker components and everything else. So it seems a bit of a waste to run several of them. I would love to be able to use this, if only it just had that one missing feature. I assumed it did when I installed it because it had every other feature under the sun from badges to tags, to a built in api, why would it not have category moderators? Every other forum out there basically does. I guess I should have specifically checked that.

Because I am still new to this forum, it may not let me reply anymore again, that happened last night as well, lol.

#10

The only thing that I think you can do is to let non moderators pin a topic I believe that everything else you can do with normal permissions.

You can create a group and assign a group owner who can decide who can join the group. You can configure a category so that only members of the group can see it. A trust level three user can change the title and category of a topic.

A user can create and edit a FAQ.

You might get by fine with a single forum.

#11

Thats the thing though, everyone needs to be able to see all of the categories, because someone who uses the product of one of them very well could use more than one. The only thing I want to be restricted is editing items in a category in which you are not assigned / allowed, but you can edit whatever is in your category. if you are the “owner” of it. That is pretty much what it boils down to.

#12

We now have Category Group Reviewing. I’d love to hear if it works for your use case!

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#13

This is now possible per Category Moderator Improvements

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#14