Get Related Topics using Cloudflare Workers AI free tier

[Discourse]

Overview

Currently we offer Related Topics to all customers hosted by Discourse. For those that are self-hosted they would require getting there own Embeddings set up, which power Related topics.

In this guide we will be exploring how to get Related Topics for free using Cloudflare Workers AI.

Pre-requisites

In order for this to work you will need the following

• Discourse AI
• Enable Related Topics
• Configure API Keys for Cloudflare Workers AI

Additionally, the following guides can be referenced

• Discourse AI - Self-Hosted Guide

Configuration

1. Once Discourse AI is enabled, you would need to enable Related Topics on your Discourse instance

@Saif

Configuration

1. Go to Admin settings-> Plugins → search or find discourse-ai and make sure its enabled
2. Enable ai_embeddings_enabled for the Embeddings module needed for Related Topics feature
3. Enable ai_embeddings_semantic_related_topics_enabled to activate the Related Topics feature

If using Cloudflare Workers AI

• Set ai embeddings model to bge-large-en.

2. Follow API Keys for Cloudflare Workers AI to get a working key inputted

@Saif

Generate the API key

1. Log in to Cloudflare. Follow the instructions in their documentation to get an API key and the Account ID
2. Generate the API Key and note the Account ID
3. Once the key is generated, store it in a safe and secure place and copy it

Using API key for Discourse AI

1. Go to Admin settings from the sidebar or profile and then Plugins
2. Search or find Discourse AI and click settings
3. Search or find ai_cloudflare_workers_api_token and input your copied-over key
4. Search or find ai_cloudflare_workers_account_id and input your copied-over ID

3. Configure the plugin to respect Cloudflare Workers AI free tier rate limits:

cd /var/discourse
./launcher enter app
rails c
SiteSetting.ai_embeddings_backfill_batch_size = 20
exit
exit
exit

Caveats

• We recommend checking usage and pricing details so you can stay within the limits and for the most up-to-date information

[packman (Chris McMahon)]

I’ve enabled this but have very quickly hit the daily limit of 10,000 neurons with the proposal that I use a paid plan instead. This is confusing, because the monthly paid plan seems to only give 300,000 neurons, or 30 times the daily free allowance of 10,000 neurons. I might consider paying a fee to get more but I can’t see why it’s beneficial to pay extra just to get exactly what I can already get free!

Edit: Just to add this isn’t a Discourse issue…just a question about using the Cloudflare service with Discourse Ai.

[Ed_S]

@packman

can’t see why it’s beneficial to pay extra

The difference with the paid plan, I think, is that you can use more than the allowance, for a usage fee. With the free plan, you simply can’t go over the allowance.

[packman (Chris McMahon)]

That’s what I was assuming. The page that they link you to for the paid plan doesn’t have that detail though.

I dug around the rest of the pricing info on the CF site and eventually found that they charge $0.011 / 1,000 Neurons over 10,000 per day. The $5/month charge is simply to allow you to be charged $0.011 / 1,000 Neurons - you don’t get any extra free for the $5/month fee.

[Isambard]

If that is correct, it is simply a terrible pricing strategy!

[Saif (Saif Murtaza)]

Seems like Workers AI is no longer free so we are removing this topic