The discussion revolves around the suggestion to exempt staff from the user mention limit in Discourse. downey initially proposed this feature, citing the need to recognize groups of users who worked on a project. However, sam argued that the introduction of group mentions has reduced the need for this feature.
jomaxro countered that group mentions are not always suitable, as moderators cannot create groups, and mentioning individual users is the only option. codinghorror agreed that staff should be immune to user mention limits.
Stefan_Fairphone shared a use case where he needed to mention multiple users in a private message, but the limit was too low. He also pointed out that creating multiple groups for different scenarios is impractical.
sam suggested using group mentions, but jomaxro and Stefan_Fairphone argued that this is not feasible due to the limitations of group mentions and the need for admin involvement.
Ultimately, techAPJ implemented the feature, allowing staff to be exempt from the user mention limit.
As a Discourse staff member (moderator/admin), I want to be able to mention more than N users in a post, so that I can do things like recognize groups who worked on a project.
N is admin-definable, but exceeding this should be possible for staff without having to temporarily change the maximum for regular users.
Now that groups are mentionable this is a lot less of a need, you can easily just mention a group like @moderators and so on. If configured they will get notifications.
Not against this being a site setting, but honestly I am not sure it really is required anymore.
@sam, I disagree with your opinion that this is not needed. Let’s say, (all hypothetically) that as @downey suggested there are 15 members who worked together on something. They completed it, and now I (a moderator) want to recognize them. But, our site has a 10 mention limit. As a moderator, I cannot exceed the limit, nor can I create a group for them (Admin only). Another disadvantage of groups (for this specific scenario) is that the names of those I am recognizing are not particularly visible to a forum user. They would have to know to click the group, then click members to find out who I was talking about.
Oh wait this is just for staff? Actually I agree with this @sam it is fine for staff to be immune to user mention limits.
As the OP here, I’d say that even with group mentions this is still a thing. It’s not really useful to create a group for each and every time we want to thank a big list of people.
I just signed up to post another use case of unlimited mentions.
I’m a community moderator at the Fairphone Forum and we are planning a community trip to Amsterdam. In a group PM I’m composing a list of all the people who are going, differentiating if it’s unsure, or if they need accommodation.
My admin raised the limit to 15 mentions because I complained, but it’s still not enough. Generally speaking, I don’t see why moderators are limited in such a way. There is a reason they are mods, namely because the admins trust them.
Is there a reason group mentions are not being used here, seems like a better fit.
We are planning a trip for Amsterdam by @going_to_amsterdam
Confirmed are
Bob, Bill, Etc… notify us if you are going and are missing from the @going_to_amsterdam group
Yes there is. Mods cannot make groups! So, if we need to mention a bunch of people, our only option is to mention each one individually.
I do agree with @sam but still, I don’t see any harm in making staff except from mentions limit. @techapj can you add this to your list?
@codinghorror, is there a reason mods cannot create groups? Seems like that would be a better solution (if you prefer group mentions to unlimited mentions…).
Yeah cause you can have groups that are not visible to mods, its a rare edge case but technically the reason.
Couldn’t that be handled in the same way as categories? Unless I am mistaken a category can be admin only, but mods can still create new categories (and even make them visible to admins only!).
I would need at least 3 groups then:
@going_to_amsterdam_but_doesnt_need_accomodation
@unsure_whether_going_to_amsterdam
@going_to_amsterdam_and_needs_accomodation
Plus: As @jomaxro says, I’d need to ask my admin to create these groups (and to add users, if I get new info from people).
PS.: There is another argument: The information, who is going, and who is not, is only relevant for the people, who have been added to the PM. A group on the other hand is public (and, btw., creates far too much overhead for the simple task of listing multiple user names).
