Unlist vs Archive

[needhelp]

Hi All,

a few questions if I may

1. does the UNLIST feature only unlist a post or topic from the forum but anyone with the URL can still access the posts or topic? so Unlisting a post or topic will not stop google from crawling that topic?

2. What does Archive do? What is the difference between UNLIST and ARCHIVE?

3. Is there an option to complete HIDE a post or topic from public view and also from google crawl so that by logging in as ADMIN is the only way to see a post or topic?

There are so many features and options with Discourse, I have been testing and experimenting for many hours today and still barely scratch the surface, so any help would be appreciated.

Thanks

[Steven]

For the archive option, there is a good recap here : Best practices for archiving topics

For your third request, the best way to do that would be to move the topic in a staff section where only admins would have access. You’ll have an easy access to it. Unlist and Archive would not prevent users having the direct link to access it if the topic is in a public category.

You could also delete a topic, a topic is never really deleted on Discouse, you can access all deleted topics with the link :

yourforum/?status=deleted

And for the record, you can check all unlisted topics with this link :

yourforum/?status=unlisted

[cpradio]

1. does the UNLIST feature only unlist a post or topic from the forum but anyone with the URL can still access the posts or topic? so Unlisting a post or topic will not stop google from crawling that topic?

No, google will no longer see the topic either (or at least is told to stop crawling it).

Reference:

Best practices for archiving topics

Yes that is an even better idea. @techapj make it so unlisting a topic removes it from Google search results by adding the no index header.

As far as making it only available to an Admin, your best bet is to move it to a category only the Admin can see.

[needhelp]

You could also delete a topic, a topic is never really deleted on Discouse, you can access all deleted topics with the link :

@Steven @cpradio THANKS both ! This concerns me that a topic is never really deleted. There are so many times when users in my community posted their telephone or email address in my forum and later on regret doing that, so they want their personal info to be completely deleted from the forum with no traces whatsoever.

Is there a way for admin to completely delete a particular posts within a topic/thread so that it no longer exists in any form or shape?

Also, there are times when I receive requests from users asking to have all their posts completely removed from the forum, is there a way to do that in Discourse or will it still leave traces?

Last but not least, just so that there is no misunderstanding here, I would like the option to be able to completely delete a particular post within a topic as well as an entire topic (one that contains many individual posts). There are times when it calls for complete deletion of an entire topic that contains many individual posts within and other times I only need to completely delete one particular post from a particular user within a big topic. I hope I do not need to delete an entire topic in order to delete just one particular poster’s post within that topic.

[riking (Kane York)]

posted their telephone or email address in my forum

The canonical action when someone accidentally posts personal information is to edit the post, and redact the revision. Click on the “this post was edited” pencil and then the trash icon.

This doesn’t really help if it’s been up for a month, though.