Direct send email to a small group in a closed category

I searched on this forum and only found this post which is quite similar to my question. But unfortunately not an answer to work upon:

We have a growing forum for our app-users. We recently started a closed category for 25+ beta testers to communicate on new features and review new betas. One of the painpoints in driving engagement and getting feedback is the lack of email possibilities. What I would like to do is make a new topic and when I save it, Discourse immediately sends out an email to the small group. I am the only one who makes new topics right now, but even when there is someone else who makes a topic, it shouldn’t be a problem. The category is very low-volume so no danger of spam.

Is this possible with Discourse? I can’t find the proper checkboxes or preferences to do this…

Thanks
Frank

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You can force all the users to watch the category. Here are a couple plugins (they’d need to be customized for your site)

https://github.com/techAPJ/discourse-watch-category-rzim/

https://github.com/amical/discourse-watch-category/

Also, if it’s email you want, you can PM the group or @mention them in the post.

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Correct me if I’m wrong but I think if the group is a large one, only a selection of people will get the email notification.

Why do you say that? The rate limiter defaults? I think that would only prevent in very large groups… he said this is 25 people.

I think I got this confused with inviting groups to messages. With invites, only a few people get notified by email not everyone in the group.

My understanding of how groups and PMs works is evolving. :wink:

It may be particular to SitePoint, and to be clear it does not bother me. I have noticed that with the group Notication, that even if I have already read the posts by a different entry point it doesn’t clear until I go to the group message topics list. (I dismiss nothing, though I scan often)

As for emails, I don’t know. I’ve never been gone that long to use or need them as a conduit.

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I would like to express strong interest in this feature also.

The plugins linked are special-cased - and exporting the user lists as suggested here is not a real-time solution (and not automated).

I strongly support the use case of being able to create categories that are “auto-watched” by users. For instance, I - like others - have been using Discourse for a class I’m teaching as a Canvas/Piazza replacement. I ask all students to read the “Announcements” category, but short of collecting their emails and creating a separate email list I have no way of pushing important announcements to them via email (something that Piazza did provide). I’d be ok if auto-subscribed users could unsubscribe themselves even.

The only currently available alternative is to ask everyone to watch this category.

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You can set defaults for category notifications in the admin settings:

You can also set default tag notifications too. :+1:

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