# Template for category replies
**URL:** https://meta.discourse.org/t/template-for-category-replies/50154
**Category:** Feature
**Created:** [September 14, 2016, 5:09pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/template-for-category-replies/50154 "2016-09-14T17:09:14Z")
**Posts on this page:** 5
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@hross](https://meta.discourse.org/u/hross)
#### Post date: [September 14, 2016, 5:09pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/template-for-category-replies/50154/1 "2016-09-14T17:09:15Z")
Howdy - One of my favorite Discourse features is that you can create templates for topics within each category. This has really helped us guide discussions proactively. I would like to do the same for replies. I don’t think this exists currently, but if it does, or there’s a workaround, I would love to know.
Here’s the use case:
We get lots of technical questions in our community, and most users engage only when and if they have something broken that they need help fixing. Then we don’t see them again, maybe ever. We are trying to expand the scope of the community into a true community of practice - where you can build your product skills by asking those break/fix questions, but you can also level up your career skills, and build a professional network. We need people to be more active more frequently to make this shift.
Part of how we’re going to make that shift (in addition to lots of new content, etc) is by changing the tone of many of our replies to those break/fix questions. Right now, most provided answers do not greet the person who asked the question, and they rarely ask clarified questions, assuming a set of circumstances that then need to be explained one clue at a time over a series of several posts.
We would like to provide a template for replies that would encourage people to ask questions, to greet each other, and a few other best practices.
We have considered that this feature might be best only for our staff, but it might be useful for the entire community.
Thanks for any guidance!
Holly
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### Author:  [@tobiaseigen](https://meta.discourse.org/u/tobiaseigen)
#### Post date: [September 14, 2016, 5:44pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/template-for-category-replies/50154/2 "2016-09-14T17:44:59Z")
Hi Holly! Have you seen the canned replies plugin? It’s pretty sweet! 🙂
> [@Discourse Canned Replies](https://meta.discourse.org/t/discourse-canned-replies/48296):
>
> mega This plugin is deprecated and won´t receive any new official updates. Please use [Discourse Templates](https://meta.discourse.org/t/discourse-templates/229250) instead. discourse2Summary Discourse Canned Replies allows staff members to create and save replies for repeated use, saving you a lot of time typing and posting the replies you post more frequently.hammer_and_wrenchRepository Link [https://github.com/discourse/discourse-canned-replies](https://github.com/discourse/discourse-canned-replies)open_bookInstall Guide This plugin is #deprecatedFeatures To use the canne…
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### Author:  [@hross](https://meta.discourse.org/u/hross)
#### Post date: [September 14, 2016, 6:01pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/template-for-category-replies/50154/3 "2016-09-14T18:01:28Z")
This looks like EXACTLY what I was looking for, but could not find. I’m still trying to figure out how to search well here. And hello old friend! 😄
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### Author:  [@Mamta\_Buch](https://meta.discourse.org/u/Mamta_Buch)
#### Post date: [September 14, 2016, 7:34pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/template-for-category-replies/50154/4 "2016-09-14T19:34:09Z")
We just started using it in conjunction with the Feature Voting plugin and it is GREAT!
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### Author:  [@erlend\_sh](https://meta.discourse.org/u/erlend_sh)
#### Post date: [September 15, 2016, 12:03pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/template-for-category-replies/50154/5 "2016-09-15T12:03:35Z")
Discussion should continue in the topic for Discourse Canned Replies 🙂