The discussion revolves around a bug in the advanced tutorial where new users (Trust Level 0) cannot create polls due to permission restrictions, preventing tutorial completion. Catija reports being stuck after successfully opening the poll creator but failing to submit it, noting the lack of early warning about the requirement. supermathie identifies the issue as a regression and suggests a fix, which is confirmed by dan and zogstrip. A fix is implemented to skip poll validation in private messages with non-human users, and a broader solution is proposed to skip the poll step for users below the required Trust Level. Catija reflects on the importance of exposing features like polls in the tutorial, arguing that excluding users due to Trust Level may hinder learning, especially since the advanced tutorial is rarely completed. The conversation highlights a tension between accessibility and feature discovery, with a consensus that the tutorial should not block users from progressing due to temporary permission issues.
I created an account and started taking your tutorial. After completing the first one, I discovered that there was an advanced tutorial so I dug in deeper.
Unfortunately, I’m now stuck as there’s a conflict between the Trust Level I have as a brand new user and the Trust Level required to create a poll. So, now I can’t complete the tutorial (though perhaps this post will raise my trust enough to make that moot).
A couple of solutions present themselves:
Exempt Discobot conversations from the Trust Level requirement so that the tutorial can be completed.
State “to continue this tutorial, you’ll need more Trust on this site”.
Either way, it might be interesting to introduce the concept of Trust Levels earlier in the tutorial (I only know about them from poking around, not from the tutorial) so that new users realize that they won’t be able to create a poll on the outset (among other things).
There may be other thoughts on this but I’d love to complete the tutorial, either way, so I’d prefer the first option. In a sandbox, I’m not sure why the TL restrictions should apply (love to hear more on this if anyone has thoughts, too!). Another slight point of friction - I wasn’t told that I couldn’t create a poll until I’d spent five minutes creating one and figuring out the various elements, so it’d be great to know about that sooner.
(Aside, Discobot is now pinging me, distressed that I’ve wandered off without completing the tutorial. It’s not my fault, little friend! I’m sorry!)
Really? I don’t know. I liked being introduced to it and it seems unlikely someone would realize that there was a new thing that they could do unless Discobot pings them to say:
Hey, there’s a new training module you can do now about polls, if you’re interested [do this]!
Yeah, realistically, very few people take the advanced tutorial - I was 165th to get the badge when I completed it yesterday vs 900th for the basic one - and many people may already be TL 1 by the time they take it, so that leaves a tiny subset who fall into my category.
I’m also not sure if Discobot is used widely on other Discourse sites. Maybe some sites encourage new users to take both tutorials so they have a higher incidence of getting stuck…
But this ties into feature support. Do you want users to know about the feature? I assume so, since you include it in the tutorial while the date/time tool and the blurred spoiler tool and the code markup tool aren’t included.
So, if you want people to use it and know about it, particularly when it’s hidden two clicks deep in the cog menu, don’t exclude them because they’re TL0. They won’t be for long if they’re that interested in learning about the platform that they found the advanced tutorial so early.
They won’t be for long if they’re that interested in learning about the platform that they found the advanced tutorial so early.