DiscPage: a plugin to create static pages and insert discussion balloons in the text

[syl]

@AntiMetaman

let’s say I have an api that retrieves an image given user input. In that link you sent, you have some combo boxes at the top. If the user selects something from the combo box, the js will show something based on that user input. Is that possible inside a static page?

I think it’s possible. In the dpg_displaypage event handler, you need to use $.ajax() to call your external API. Also, I think you need to add your external API to the content security policy script src Discourse setting.

[misterjtc (Jordan Cook)]

It looks like this plugin is still maintained, but I seem to have isolated an issue on my server where the login page is not viewable when this plugin is enabled. I am hoping to get this solved.

If this plugin is enabled on my server I can confirm that the login page appears blank and if I disable the plugin then the login page appears as normal again. If a user is already logged in then the issue isn’t present and the server works as normal.

Looking for some help/support to solve this. I am happy to provide any additional information required to support troubleshooting.

[syl]

Thanks Jordan.
Yes, I will need some more information, as I’ve checked on my various Discourse instances and couldn’t reproduce the issue.
When you say “the login page is not viewable”, you mean the login popup, right?
Please give me some more details and/or screenshots. Also, if possible, PM me and provide the url of your Discourse instance.

[misterjtc (Jordan Cook)]

Hey Syl,

Thanks for the reply.

When I have the discpage plugin enabled and I go to the discourse instance when not logged in, I am presented with a completely blank page. See below:

I did also just recently check the console logs and noticed there are some errors related to discpage. Although they don’t mean anything to me. Maybe they mean something to you…

[syl]

Thanks for reporting this. The bug has been filed here:
https://github.com/sylque/discpage/issues/17
Until the bug is fixed, a workaround is to disable the “login required” Discourse setting.

EDIT: the bug is now fixed.

[Benjamin_D (Benjamin Decotte)]

Hi Syl,
It’s a bit awkward sorry to be blunt, I was looking at the source of the plugin, just by curiosity, having no coding skill whatsoever, and I’m confused by the formatting of the lib file. I assume it’s not a technical choice (but what do I know ), and I can imagine and understand where it comes from.
I kind of feel you’re midstream, and it’s already great, so I really don’t want to sound ungrateful, but would you consider sharing an intelligible version of your work?
IMHO in the long run, the pace of the core upgrades can be challenging to follow for the plugins authors, it might ease the mind of those who could use the features of your plugin but hesitate to build something relying on the shoulders of too few people, and why not it might even create some goodwill and interest?

Many thx anyway

[syl]

Hi Benjamin,
The plugin’s source code is released in minified form because I’m ashamed of it. It is the result of an R&D experiment and needs extensive refactoring. I postponed the task until the plugin raises some interest.

[Benjamin_D (Benjamin Decotte)]

well, you can count me in the “very interested” column !
I think it’s a very nice variation to the core “quote” feature.
I’m looking for an incentive for my users to engage in some speeches analysis (which is quite close from your Castafiore use I think, much less entertaining hélas!), and hopefully this design might tip them in writing mode.

[Benjamin_D (Benjamin Decotte)]

So far so good !
my 2 cents:

• humble opinion about the header, I’d rather keep it centered, i feel it integrates the static pages of the plugin more seamlessly in a globally “normal” discourse.
• fringe case: it might be interesting to specify a balloon category per static category, in case multiple static categories have different read/write rights.
• am I missing something or does the [dpgb id=titre] [/dpgb] (which are cooked into balloons I believe) are to be set by hand? I candidly (and unsuccessfully!) tried the quote button of the composer, doh . It’s probably required as the tag slug is to be set
• could the discpage hide tags setting become hide discpage tags instead ? I don’t really apprehend the difficulty of hidding only the dpg-**** tags but I think they might clog a bit the suggested list when creating a topic

next step, the user engagement test !

[syl]

Thanks @Benjamin_D, your feedback is most welcome.

@Benjamin_D

humble opinion about the header, I’d rather keep it centered, i feel it integrates the static pages of the plugin more seamlessly in a globally “normal” discourse.

The header alignment must fit:

1. Normal Discourse pages (max-width = 1110px),
2. DiscPage static pages (max-width = 782px, because 1110px is too wide for a static page where you cannot put side bars/widgets/pictures),
3. DiscPage split layout, with a static page on the left and topics on the right (max-width = 100%).

I did many tests, with both fixed header alignment and layout-dependant header alignment, and came to the conclusion that a permanent left alignment was the way to go.

However, I will gladly check any idea you can come up with. Be sure to address the three above cases.

@Benjamin_D

fringe case: it might be interesting to specify a balloon category per static category, in case multiple static categories have different read/write rights.

It’s already supported, see this paragraph in the doc:

In fact, you can set multiple categories in here. Let's call PageCat the category of the static page the balloon belongs to. If there are more than one balloon category in this field, DiscPage will take the first one which is either a sibling of PageCat (same immediate parent) or the immediate parent of PageCat. If no such category is found, DiscPage will take the first category of the list. This feature allows to pair [static page category, balloon category], which is useful, for example, for multilingual forums or to set up static pages with different group permissions.

I agree this is not easy to grasp. Any idea on how to improve the phrasing is welcome.

@Benjamin_D

am I missing something or does the [dpgb id=titre] [/dpgb] (which are cooked into balloons I believe) are to be set by hand? I candidly (and unsuccessfully!) tried the quote button of the composer, doh . It’s probably required as the tag slug is to be set

Yes, the balloons are to be inserted by hand using a text syntax.
When you first tried the plugin, why did you feel the quote button would be of any help? (I’m interested in your mental state at that moment)

@Benjamin_D

could the discpage hide tags setting become hide discpage tags instead ? I don’t really apprehend the difficulty of hidding only the dpg-**** tags but I think they might clog a bit the suggested list when creating a topic

The hide discpage tags feature is already implemented: DiscPage tags are hidden by default in all Discourse pages and widgets. In other words, if you can see a DiscPage tag anywhere (when DiscPage is enabled), that’s a bug.

The discpage hide tags setting is very different: it allows people who don’t want to enable tags in their Discourse instance, but who were forced to do so in order to use DiscPage, to simulate an instance without tags.

[Benjamin_D (Benjamin Decotte)]

@syl

The header justification must fit:

1. Normal Discourse pages (max-width = 1110px),
2. DiscPage static pages (max-width = 782px, because 1110px is too wide for a static page where you cannot put side bars/widgets/pictures),
3. DiscPage split layout, with a static page on the left and topics on the right (max-width = 100%).

I did many tests, with both fixed header justification and layout-dependant header justification, and came to the conclusion that a permanent left justification was the way to go.

Actually, it’s more the max-width = 1110px that i’d keep, even if, in split screen, the static page under the header takes 100%. I commented out the html.dpg header.d-header .wrap block and it doesn’t feel too bad having a little white around the header above the static split page (even if the edit title and page buttons seem a bit lost up there, non split layout).

@syl

It’s already supported, see this paragraph in the doc :

Silly me, RTFM (in my defense I probably did last year, and forgot )
I didn’t remember that discpage hid the balloon category (having just tested it as an admin) but that’s a great feature.

So if I understand correctly, in case of multiple {static page category, users rights}, one should make an associated balloon category a sub-category of the static one (which makes sense from the rights POV), or should have both categories as sub-categories of the same third parent one. Not important, but would it also work if the static one is a sub-category of the balloon one?

@syl

When you first tried the plugin, why did you feel the quote button would be of any help? (I’m interested in your mental state at that moment)

Probably just the balloon shape of the icon, in conjunction with the fact that I’ve probably never used the quote button of the composer, and maybe I thought, Hey, was that there before? So I tried
I don’t care having to write a few strings of “code” but I can hear my users howling from here. Maybe they just won’t set themselves the static pages for now. Sometime I feel every stoke on the keyboard can be the last straw…

@syl

The hide discpage tags feature is already implemented: DiscPage tags are hidden by default in all Discourse pages and widgets. In other words, if you can see a DiscPage tag anywhere (when DiscPage is enabled), that’s a bug.

The discpage hide tags setting is very different: it allows people who don’t want to enable tags in their Discourse instance, but who were forced to do so in order to use DiscPage, to simulate an instance without tags.

Of course, sorry… I’m gonna put this on my slight fever, I don’t know why I thought that they weren’t hidden, maybe I saw the glimpse of one in the tag drop-down box in the balloon part of the split screen ? I now understand the trailing comma I saw trying everything I could, even tagging the balloon topics!

[Benjamin_D (Benjamin Decotte)]

Would it be possible to let users create and edit (their) static posts? The admin restriction could then only be achieved with the category security settings.

edit:
maybe not, modifying a tag_groups seems StaffConstraint

I can let a TL4 user set a balloon with changing a = User.current()) && a.admin into User.current()) && a.trust_level >= 4 but the tag won’t be created until an admin edit the static page…
Something would be great : a category moderator that would be able to change the tag group of its category

[Benjamin_D (Benjamin Decotte)]

BTW, I’ve found that the plugin checklist seems to interfere with discpage (something about getmodel() )

[syl]

@Benjamin_D

I commented out the html.dpg header.d-header .wrap block and it doesn’t feel too bad having a little white around the header above the static split page.

I prefer the current layout. However, there should be an easy way to customize this. I will think about it.

@Benjamin_D

Not important, but would it also work if the static one is a sub-category of the balloon one?

No, this combination is not supported.

@Benjamin_D

Would it be possible to let users create and edit (their) static posts? The admin restriction could then only be achieved with the category security settings.

As you already figured, creating static pages is not limited to admins, but inserting balloons is. The reason is that there is no straightforward way to create tags in Discourse (see this thread). To do so, I chose to use the tag group API, which is restricted to admins. There were alternate solutions, but coming with their own drawbacks.

@Benjamin_D

BTW, I’ve found that the plugin checklist seems to interfere with discpage (something about getmodel() )

You mean this plugin? What’s wrong?

[Benjamin_D (Benjamin Decotte)]

@syl

You mean this plugin? What’s wrong?

Indeed, with the two plugins enabled, refreshing a static page, well kind of switch off discpage (return a normal layout) and the console throws an error:

Uncaught (in promise) TypeError: postModel is undefined
checklistSyntax javascripts/discourse/initializers/checklist:29

Both plugins works fine separately

[syl]

Thanks @Benjamin_D. The issue has been filed here:
https://github.com/sylque/discpage/issues/19

EDIT: this has been fixed in the latest version (1.0.38).

[Benjamin_D (Benjamin Decotte)]

Hi @syl , hate to be the bearer of bad news , I’ve found another compatibility issue, a bit more problematic, with discpage enabled an invite link leads to a blank page (instead of the register page).
browser console says:

  r.site.categories is undefined

disabling the plugin makes the invite link works as usual.

[syl]

Thanks a lot for reporting this, @Benjamin_D . This is yet another bug with the “login required” mode, so I’ve reopened the previous GitHub issue. Until this is fixed, a workaround is to disable the “login required” mode.

EDIT: this has been fixed in the latest version (1.0.38)

[Benjamin_D (Benjamin Decotte)]

Hi @syl !
I think the recent tag routes change
https://github.com/discourse/discourse/commit/3c51647872b4118c5f6139c375fd8e4079bc7252
has broken something
a minima the link in the bubbles should now points toward /tag/dpg-xxx and not /tags/dpg-xxx

[syl]

Thanks @Benjamin_D, this has been fixed in v1.0.38.