Ok, that changes everything. I was probably confused by the language of the user’s message that made it sound like it was sent before the notification.
It starts to make more sense, especially since I now configured Discourse such that system messages are sent by “system” instead of by myself [1] but there is still one design flaw, IMHO: It’s really hard to tell to whom the PM is addressed to.
[1] I don’t recall ever changing this, why isn’t it the default? Could it be due to years of automatic settings upgrades?
I could be wrong, but I believe historically (many versions ago) the first admin on the site was set as the site contact. If you were to install a site today you’d go through the “new site wizard” where you’d select who you want the contact to be.
One note on this - you will no longer be notified if someone replies to an automated message. The message clearly says “this is an automated message” at the top, but users will still likely reply to it. Just something to keep in mind - you may miss messages.
That would make a lot of sense and it’s what I was suspecting. I’ve been using Discourse for a long time so it could be.
I was thinking about that, I suspect that users answered because they thought I had sent the message… If they decide to answer to “the system” then there isn’t much we can do, is there?
Wait a second – why doesn’t Discourse close these automatically if they are sent from @system? We’re already doing this for the welcome post sent by Discobot when the narrative is disabled:
I’m guessing that was rhetorical, but in case it wasn’t discobot was introduced long after @system was sending automated messages. I do like the idea - if no one can see replies to the automated message, don’t let users reply!
Could even put a small body in the close notice to make sure people know what to do (seems easier than editing every template).
[lock] [avatar] CLOSED 1 DAY AGO
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